Die My Love with Alison Willmore

7:06Griffin Newman:but they really like to make fun of his scarf

7:08Alison Willmore:the thing is like do you see him in scarves now no

7:11David Sims:no no it clearly it's his version of the Eddie Murphy laugh where he's like fine are you happy I stopped and now his neck is so fucking cold it's so cold all the time what's going to happen to him I love that that was his explanation at the time where he's like I have a very sensitive throat is that what he sounds like

7:29Alison Willmore:yeah he did he was like I'm very susceptible that's not a bad impression

7:32David Sims:I don't know what he sounds like I don't

7:34Alison Willmore:it's like

7:34David Sims:I have some sort of throat.

7:36Alison Willmore:I guess, so did anyone watch his AI American Revolution series then?

7:41Griffin Newman:Only to jerk off to it. No, I didn't watch it. I didn't watch it. I didn't watch it. I absorbed it. I sat my ass down and listened. So it's he used AI to make a Revolutionary War series.

7:56Alison Willmore:Like web series. That's like reenactments. But it's just like, imagine if we could see. Right. You are there. Paul Revere or something like that.

8:03Griffin Newman:be like, this is what AI is for. It's so that we can do large-scale production quickly. And he's like, I hire, oh, good.

8:13Alison Willmore:It looks like spookily dead-eyed in a Polar Express way. It looks like a Polar Express kind of thing.

8:18Griffin Newman:I watch, I look at TikTok all the time, right? And TikTok will serve you AI in the middle of like a person being like, look, my baby fell sideways. Yeah. Which is what I'm there for. Yeah, yeah. Thank you, China. We're still in the place, and maybe this will change one day, but where you're just like, I know it's AI immediately. There's just a quality. You know it when you see it.

8:40David Sims:Look, that's how I feel. And every time I see some fucker post something and go like, Hollywood is cooked. This is what AI can do now. I'm like, bullshit. It's not good enough. And then I'm also like, what? Like six months from now, maybe it is. And I'm like, great. So reality doesn't exist anymore.

8:56Griffin Newman:My thing has always been like the way I feel about video games, where I'm like, it got better and better and better, but it never got where we all, when we were younger, thought it was going to get. I mean, it's the Uncanny Valley thing. Yeah. I think it is true.

9:12David Sims:Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'll be a fool. That's my worry. My worry is that you will be a fool. Have you seen, there's one that keeps going around that's like, it took like thousands of people and hundreds of millions of dollars to make like friends. And this is what like Sora can whip up right now. And it's a super cut of like fake AI friends scenes. I've seen this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you're like, oh, it is weird how real it looks, but also they are speaking gibberish. And it's like Chandler walks through the door and he's like, well, I got pizza.

9:45Griffin Newman:And then everyone laughs. It's very weird because right there. The lines don't make sense. They are speaking English, but not legible English. And they keep walking in and out of doors that aren't connected to anything. And the doors keep moving around. You know, so it's great. It's like a melatonin nightmare. It's fascinating.

10:01David Sims:You're like, sort of is real. Because you're like, whatever AI app has started to be like, okay, so like 30 % of friends is people dramatically walking through doors into apartments. It must be about that. This must happen four times per scene. And they have everyone's like tone and the rhythm of everyone's joke delivery, right? But they don't understand how to build jokes through dialogue. And then like, none of them look exactly like them. all of them look like they're stand-ins, but they look like real people. And then the Phoebe will sit down and split into two people the second she hits the couch.

10:37David Sims:Literally, like, asexually reproducing

10:41Alison Willmore:into two people on a cushion. I remember that episode. Yeah, it's a good one. The video I got served, which is stuck in my brain, is like some guy who made an AI video as if he were visiting the set of a Dragon Ball Z movie.

10:55Griffin Newman:I saw this. And he's like hugging Goku.

10:57Alison Willmore:Yeah, so he's basically, it's like as if he had just gone on and everyone were forced to take a selfie with him. And it's all of these incredibly famous people that he has like fan cast as different characters.

11:06David Sims:And people are like, Hollywood is cooked. And I'm like, I don't know, you just seem sad.

11:10Alison Willmore:Yeah, and I'm like, you know, the problem with this is also like, it's like your limit, the limits of your imagination are like. I wish they were my friends. Yes.

11:20David Sims:What if, what if Goku thought I was cool? What's our podcast? I tried entries and you didn't take the bait. For once, I just want to let the record show. I'm so sorry. I missed it. What did you say? You said, let's stop right now and talk about Francis Lawrence. And I said, fine. This podcast was Blank Check with Griffin and David.

11:37Griffin Newman:Oh, I didn't. Okay, okay. It's pretty funny.

11:39David Sims:That is funny. Thank you. You're welcome. I'm Griffin. I'm David. It's a podcast about filmographies. Directors who have massive success early on in their careers, kind of, and are given a series of blank checks, sort of, to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. And sometimes those checks clear, and sometimes they get bought for$20 million at hand and become kind of like, I don't know, a cautionary tale? A little bit. I think a little bit of a cautionary tale business-wise, yeah. Allison and I were talking about this the other day, and you have not been introduced yet, Allison. Could you introduce her?

12:12David Sims:Hold on a second. This is more important. Allison and I were talking the other day about how it feels like in the flop fall kind of trend piecing of a bunch of A-list movie stars had sort of prestigy dramas that were given wide releases that were supposed to hopefully cross over to some degree in the mainstream and also to Oscar results completely flatline. And it feels like this was always included in that grouping of here's a list of five movies in the last eight weeks. With the others being... Christie, Smashing Machine, Roofman to a lesser degree. you know I feel like there's one more I'm the Springsteen movie you could argue kind of argue yeah those are five pure theatrical

12:57Griffin Newman:releases that all had what did all of those movies in I'll tell you not die my love but like it was reviews yes really it's like none of those really count on with anyone this is what's interesting

13:07David Sims:to me is I feel like this is the one of those films that was well received it was well received maybe not rave raves but it was well received people liked it yes all the other ones Like even Christie, the strongest reviews were the like, it's weird that she's this good in this movie that is unpleasant to watch. And why did she make this? It's very long. Right. The positive reviews all kind of had like flashing red lights that weren't really going to draw an audience in. I feel like this movie doesn't get wasn't turned into a punchline as much, despite it having like two A-listers and not converting into serious nominations anywhere.

13:46David Sims:but it's sort of with distance just part of the narrative of like what was like the weird movie 2025 sure I mean

13:58Griffin Newman:it was ludicrous to put this on I don't think anyone could really be like how dare Jennifer Lawrence not make this into a hit no like in a serious way

14:08Alison Willmore:it is a very jagged intentionally abrasive movie yeah Yeah.

14:14Griffin Newman:And it's a little it was to me, it was a little bit more like, oh, movie, like just because the substance broke through doesn't mean you can do this with anything like you silly.

14:25Alison Willmore:I mean, they also clearly were like, for this amount of money, in the very least, we're going to have bought a Best Actress nomination.

14:32David Sims:I think that's what they thought. And the other part of what's interesting about this movie to me is I just feel like a lot of people I talked to just don't know this happened. and yet Jennifer Lawrence was like as out there as she has been in many, many years. She did get out there. And kept doing it like in the lead up to theatrical release throughout the whole award season. She's not making precursor lists and she's still doing stuff. And all the stuff she was doing was hitting like classic Jennifer Lawrence where people were kind of like, thank God she's back. You know what? I missed this.

15:04David Sims:And yet none of that energy went back over to the movie.

15:07Griffin Newman:Because it doesn't.

15:08David Sims:It just doesn't. It doesn't go to the movies. No, that's, I think, the biggest lesson learned from 2025.

15:13Griffin Newman:Like, you doing playing Operation with Robert Pattinson will not mean anyone sees the movie. They simply watched a fun clip. Right. You gave eyeballs to Variety or whoever.

15:24David Sims:It will monetize that clip. Yes. And it might sell copies of Operation. It actually doesn't get your movie anywhere.

15:32Alison Willmore:Well, I think especially when you're like... And why should it? At best, right. At best, you're mentioning this movie to a bunch of people who maybe, maybe will remember to look it up and then go, oh, that doesn't look like something I want to watch.

15:44David Sims:Right, and that's like, you watch Jennifer Lawrence kill it on Hot Ones for like 25 minutes, and when she says like, through tears, my new movie is called Die My Love, it's in theaters, whatever. Right. That basically, I think for most listeners, is the equivalent of, thank you for watching, please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. You know, it's just like white noise, you tune that part out. And I think the industry started thinking, well, this is the way to market, this is the way to break through to this audience. And what they don't understand is that those aren't marketing tools. Those are their competition.

16:14Griffin Newman:Who's our guest?

16:14David Sims:Our guest today. From Vulture. From the new podcast, Critical Darlings. A Blank Check production. The great Alison Wilmore.

16:25Alison Willmore:Hello. Hello.

16:27Griffin Newman:Ooh, Remain just got pushed to February 2027.

16:30David Sims:Wow. Okay.

16:31Griffin Newman:I'll take it off the spreadsheet.

16:33David Sims:Alison, the seismic waves on our spreadsheet. The scheduling changes that just happened are insane.

16:40Alison Willmore:Wow. It's gone. Here's a Jennifer Lawrence thing, an observation I would like to make. She famously took a few years off, right? And kind of was like, I need to reset. I need to, people are going to get sick of me. And also, like, clearly she was like, I need to figure out what my grown-up career as a movie star looks like, right? And she has, this is what? Like her third, essentially soft relaunch, right? at this point.

17:05David Sims:Causeway is like an unbelievably soft relaunch.

17:08Alison Willmore:But Causeway was like, she was also like, I'm a producer now, right? She's like, I am not just going to be in, you know, playing characters that are 10 to 20 years too old for me in David O. Russell movies by God. Like, I am going to take control of my career and pick interesting roles for her. And she has her

17:25Griffin Newman:producing, is it Justine Ciaracci? Yeah. Is that her second oldest friend? Yeah. Like, they met in the movie biz, right? I forget if she... Maybe not her oldest friend, but like her closest movie friend. She was like a crew, She was like her assistant on Hunger Games. Yeah, exactly.

17:36Alison Willmore:Yeah.

17:37Griffin Newman:And they basically come up together. They seem to have great taste. Yes. The things they produced are Causeway, No Hard Feelings, and Die My Love. And I was going to say... Three movies I like. Right. Causeway, unbelievably... And two docs that I don't know much about.

17:49David Sims:Right. Small movie lost in the sort of post-pandemic morass. Does get a Best Supporting Actor nomination. But more than anything, felt like, I think what you're saying, a proclamation of, here's phase two. I'm developing material. I'm finding people I want to work with.

18:04Alison Willmore:and doesn't get noticed much, but that's fine. Then she does. But it got an Oscar note. Yeah. Yeah. It did sneak that Oscar note. I know. But it was in that weird, like also like pandemic-y era. I know.

18:15Griffin Newman:But like there's so many Apple projects, most of them starring Mahershala Ali. I feel like he was in like three.

18:20Alison Willmore:Yeah. You know where you're like,

18:21David Sims:hasn't Mahershala made anything in seven years? Yeah. And then you're like, he's made so many things. I know.

18:26Alison Willmore:And like Cosway, not a bad movie. Brian Tyree Henry, fantastic. Very bad.

18:30David Sims:I was going to say, it felt like part of the phase two thing that all the press she was doing for that movie was kind of just pushing him. It felt like I mean, they had talked about that movie was written to be something very different. And he had a very small part. And they were like assembling an edit. And they were like, it feels like the only stuff that's working as our scenes together. And they went back and rewrote and reshot a lot of it. And she was like, this is a two hander. And it felt like part of her. This is my next stage is like, who do I want to work with? Who do I want to boost?

18:59David Sims:And she uses all her power to basically get him a nomination for a movie that no one remembers.

19:03Alison Willmore:Yeah. And then she makes No Hard Feelings. Which was good! It was good, but she is like, look at me doing a hard comedy, right?

19:10Griffin Newman:I know. There was this sort of a try-hard element to that whole rollout, and then I saw the movie and I was like, I think this movie is sort of a cut above. And I really like the underlying themes of that movie. I like that it's about like trashy Long Island, like true, like Montauk lifer people being like, man, it fucking sucks here now. Like all these rich people have moved here. Like, you know, like that's like the undercurrent of that movie is good. I agree. I think that movie fucks up the ending. And that movie's fun.

19:41David Sims:The ending's a little blah. Yeah. But that movie also has kind of a weird reputation because it's like there was a lot of is this the Great White Hope that brings back that theatrical comedy? Here's Jennifer Lawrence, one of her most powerful movie star. She hasn't made a commercial film in over six years. Here she's back post-pandemic doing a sex comedy. Is this going to light the world on fire? And it does well.

20:05Alison Willmore:But not the way people wanted it to.

20:07David Sims:Immediately explodes way more on Netflix. And people were like, why wasn't this a bigger hit? But then you're like, guys, come on. She was right here. Support her when it's happening.

20:17Alison Willmore:Yeah. And then now we have Die My Love, which is the movie that was going to be like, here she is, serious actress, like, doing this, like, really, like, wrenching, difficult, real work, just going places you haven't ever seen her go before. And, yeah, and again, it does not really get there.

20:34David Sims:No, and it's also fascinating because this is one of her best performances, I think. Oh, I think she's incredible. It's, like, arguable it's her best performance. And, yeah, it's arguable. I think it's in the conversation.

20:45Alison Willmore:I think it also, like, it...

20:46David Sims:It's sort of where...

20:47Griffin Newman:It's how you think of Winner's Bone.

20:49Alison Willmore:Yeah, and I think it also, it's so... it's such a deliberately difficult role, right? Like, it just is, like, both opaque, but also, like, so raw. Like, she is both, like, letting you into these, like, incredibly dark, weird emotions, but also, and I think this is a bit of a Lynne Ramsey thing, you're, like, you're kept at a distance from her, right? You can't entirely figure her out. And so, yeah, it's, I mean, she has to work with a lot of, I don't know, deal with a lot of different kind of, like, tensions, but, I mean, she goes, like, she just throws herself in it so littleheartedly.

21:21David Sims:Also, possibly why Mubi went so like goo goo eyed at this movie where you're like, fuck, it's funny. Like she is so inherently funny and is able to make comedy out of odd, difficult things, Jennifer Lawrence, even just in her like oversharing press tour way that you're like, fuck, if you map that onto a Lin Ramsey movie, does this thing have enough kind of like weirdo laughs like the substance that there's a more commercial push for it? But then you're like, what's the movie about? And you're like, well, a woman collapses, completely deconstructs. It's a fascinating case. And yeah, I think, you know, she's doing the Scorsese movie next.

22:03David Sims:It feels like she's being very selective. There was this moment a couple months back, David, where they announced like one weekend of filming that Taylor Russell was being recast in Michael B. Jordan's very expensive starring and directed by Thomas Crown Affair remake. and in one of our group texts, we were like, okay, thought experiment. Who do you slot in there? If you're Michael B. Jordan and you're like one of the like kings of 2025 and this is your next directing project and your chosen female co-star doesn't work and you need someone on set within like less than five days and you presumably want someone who you can like go toe-to-toe with, right age level, you know, whatever it is.

22:45David Sims:We were like, who does he pick? And we were throwing out names and I at one point said like, I mean, if you really fucking want to go for it, you cast Jennifer Lawrence. You cast Jennifer Lawrence in the Faye Dunaway, Rene Russo part. But is he willing to see that much ego? And beyond that, you said no. And you also said, I think she's just firmly in her weirdo phase now. A little bit. I think she doesn't really want to play that game. There's an argument that, you know, her reps would probably be like, please, Jennifer, can you just get paid$20 million to do this and then make three more weirdo movies?

23:20David Sims:and it feels like to her credit, she's like kind of done with the game, want to just use my power to make whatever I want to make and work with who I want to work for and with. And I also think in talking about her like sort of disappearing for a couple years and why there was so much energy and excitement for this movie, it's also like she had two kids. She like focused on her family. She focused on her personal life and Causeway and No Hard Feelings aren't tapping into that. No Hard Feelings is kind of pretending She hasn't gone through the growth that she has talked about in the press. And so when this movie's announced, it's like, oh, well, here's Jennifer Lawrence who seemingly holds nothing back.

24:00David Sims:And she's making a postpartum movie. What is she going to share with us?

24:04Griffin Newman:Right, right. What, this is the problem with being a Jennifer Lawrence, Angelina Jolie-style movie star where it's like every movie has to be like, okay, but what is it saying about you right now? Like, you know, what phase of life are you in? What era, what Taylor Swift era are you doing now?

24:22David Sims:I think it's less that it's like, what is the comment you're trying to make or what is the statement? And with her, it's more, especially in her 20s, David O. Russell kept pushing her into these roles that were 10 years ahead of her in life experience. and you were like, I guess through sheer movie star power, I am vaguely buying this woman being widowed, having two children, all these things. And it just for someone who feels so emotionally intelligent but was able to kind of render these things that she had no experience with, I think it was more like, is this about to be some level up moment in her ability with her being able to pull from life?

25:06David Sims:Not what she's trying to communicate to us in the press or how she's going to use this movie to talk about her own personal experiences, but more, does she have a new well to draw from?

25:16Alison Willmore:I think that's true. But I think it's also, I think we've all been waiting. You know, she is someone who is this very powerful and undeniable A-list actor. But like, she has spent so much of her career either, yes, in these roles that didn't feel quite right for her, that she made work through sheer talent with David O. Russell, or in these giant franchises, right? Like, at the same time, she's playing a widow and a mother of two. she's playing this fighting teenager, right? You know, she's playing Katniss in The Hunger Games and she's playing Mystique. There is this real sense that so much of her career, so much of the path that made her this giant movie star was also like never quite right.

25:55Alison Willmore:You know, like she was always playing roles that were never quite, they didn't seem like something that was kind of like defining her or like that she really had a full, like that fit her perfectly, you know?

26:04David Sims:No, it's odd. It is odd for someone who you step back with some distance and her 2010s is even more astounding by how kind of anomalous it was at a time where the industry was like, maybe movie stars don't exist anymore. And she became pretty undeniable. And yet it was like they they milked that so hard and so fast. and the whole kind of like inevitable Jennifer Lawrence backlash, which she clearly in doing press for this movie took very personally and was like, I'm too much. You know, I wasn't aware how people were seeing me. It's also just like you break down the years and you're like, she was making two or three movies a year and it was basically every year she was alternating between an X-Men and a Hunger Games and a prestige movie.

26:55Yeah.

26:56Griffin Newman:Yeah. I just, it's interesting on this press tour with, who was I listening to? So I listened to, she was on Polar's thing. She did that kind of like. Late? What? No, late I was saying. Like she did that fairly recently. Well, I think Polar kind of doesn't care. It seems as much about like, you know, timing it to really, I don't know. She did that kind of like half hour chat with Leo, the actors and actors thing, which was like, you know, no one has quite gotten Leo to open up, but like she had her moments with him, It's like the closest I've seen. Like a couple moments with him. But I'm trying to remember where...

27:34Griffin Newman:She sort of acknowledged, essentially, to one of those. David O. Russell, I think, really taught me how to act. I know that's not the experience everyone has with him. You know, like... And she didn't say it in a dismissive way. She said it in a kind of like, I think it was quite helpful for me. I do know that the way he works was not helpful for some people. She hasn't worked with him since Joy. I always found...

27:59Alison Willmore:An incredibly weird movie also. Such a weird movie.

28:01Griffin Newman:I mean, that movie came out early in the history of this podcast. We talk about it a lot on one of our Force Awakens episodes with Emily Ishida because I think I had just seen it. Because it is indeed a really weird movie. And it has all the problems that all the movies she made with him had where she's fundamentally wrong for the role. She's kind of working it anyway. Like, she's kind of like... But then the movie that's happening around her is also kind of chaotic and stupid. I was thinking about... Like, Silver Linings is the best of those movies. and I think that's like a really chaotic

28:30David Sims:and no I agree I agree we in the week we were recording this the most recent episode of Critical Darlings was talking about Begonia and Emma Stone and your ghost kind of getting into that David O. Russell Jennifer Lawrence auto lock nomination Oscar favorite state and no one was pissed when Emma Stone was announced as a best actress candidate I didn't feel that

28:52Alison Willmore:people were not like oh yes that's like you know but no one was angry

28:57David Sims:But I can't remember if you or Richard said this, but the morning that Jennifer Lawrence made it into the Joy 5, there was a feeling of like, fuck that. And it's that kind of thing that Ben Affleck talks about of like the weekend after Gigli being like, I'm in the worst state my career could possibly be in. I can sell magazine covers, but I can't sell movie tickets. Everyone wants to hear about how I'm fucking up in my personal life and no one wants to hire me. Everyone else can make money off of me. And there's that sort of feeling of like, OK, Jennifer Lawrence, you automatically get nominated every time.

29:29David Sims:People now resent you for it, which just the moment that movie came out, it was just like it happened one time too many. It's too late. Everyone wants you to go away now.

29:39Alison Willmore:Yeah. And I mean, so like after that, she did what, like Passengers?

29:44David Sims:Mm hmm. A disaster. Yeah, a disaster.

29:46Alison Willmore:Like just like a really incredibly unpleasant.

29:49David Sims:Yes. One of the most miscalculated, like, star packaging. Yeah.

29:54Alison Willmore:Yes. And of course, a blacklist script. Yes. It's often a very cursed thing.

29:58David Sims:I have often contended you read that original script and it's a really good Twilight Zone premise. And it was so buzzy and it necessitated such high production value because of the space thing that everyone in Hollywood thought it was meant to be romantic. that they just interpreted it entirely wrong.

30:20Griffin Newman:Yeah. Right. Maybe there's a better version of that movie with what director? I don't know.

30:26David Sims:I'm trying to remember who the director...

30:28Griffin Newman:I mean, there's, you know, like Fincher.

30:30David Sims:Yes. Like, you know, like, but I mean, like, why would he... I mean, I guess... There was an earlier version of that movie announced. I'm trying to remember if there was a director ever attached, but I believe it was supposed to be Keanu Reeves and Rachel McAdams. And you're like, immediately, that makes so much more sense.

30:43Griffin Newman:I mean, those are actors I vastly prefer. the problem is they are not, you know, who Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt were in 2015.

30:51David Sims:At that point in particular, that version of the movie died because it was pre-John Wick Keanu. And it was like, he is worth negative money. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. But you're like, the sad haunted Keanu thing.

31:03Alison Willmore:Yeah, that would make so much more sense in terms of what that character does. I know.

31:07David Sims:Rather than Star-Lord being like,

31:08Alison Willmore:I woke you up! Right, right. Like, aren't you psyched? Now we have to live our full lives together. Yeah.

31:14David Sims:Imagine Dragon's place. Passengers, yes. Passengers, and then Mother. Which was much like this, like a wide release, like out of the gates that bombed.

31:24Alison Willmore:Yes. And also, I mean, is this...

31:26Griffin Newman:It's similar, right, where there are like 3 ,000 screens for this and the audience is like,

31:30Alison Willmore:no, what? What are you doing? Also, I don't know, it has weird undercurrents, you know, like their relationship, but also so much of that movie is just tormenting her. It is just like...

31:41Griffin Newman:Yeah, yeah. Yes, that movie is her going... She's actively stressed. She's shouting her head off about the sink not being braced. Yeah, and then the baby. Remember the baby? They eat the baby. They eat the baby. As I happily tell people,

31:56Alison Willmore:George Clooney said,

31:59Griffin Newman:I hear they eat a baby. I'm into that.

32:01David Sims:They eat a baby, as many X-Men directors have done.

32:07David Sims:Is that my new terminology? We have normal and we have X-Men director? Go on, Allison.

32:13Alison Willmore:Well, and then, you know, you have like Dark Phoenix. It's not a movie. Disaster. Never happened. Yeah. And then Don't Look Up.

32:19David Sims:Yeah.

32:20Alison Willmore:You know?

32:21David Sims:When is Red Sparrow in there?

32:23Griffin Newman:Oh, Red Sparrow. I missed Red Sparrow. Red Sparrow is right before Dark Phoenix. A movie I softly defend, but certainly never like cared to revisit.

32:30Alison Willmore:I don't think I ever saw it. I always think of it as like her salt, right?

32:34Griffin Newman:It's her salt. It is very obviously, and she has talked about it, about the sex crimes that were visited upon her. and her trying to kind of reclaim her naked body on screen and her sort of whatever, her sexuality, her like feminine sort of...

32:51David Sims:It's an ownership of sexuality. Yes.

32:53Griffin Newman:Yes. And it's also like a decent-ish spy movie, but you are kind of like, this is like a Verhoeven movie, and I like Francis Lawrence, but he's no Paul Verhoeven, and like this is not quite nasty or freaky enough, but it is like an R-rated, sexy, kind of violent spy thriller. And so you come away with kind of like, okay, you know, I ate an okay sandwich there. I know that could have been better. But when you look at, what was it, five Hunger Games movies?

33:26David Sims:Because it's four books and five movies. Yeah, I just thought there were two, right? Mockingjay was two parts. Yes. She makes four X-Men movies. The first three work commercially to some degree. and then the first two David O. Russell movies like soar past 100 million, you know, 300 worldwide, whatever. That block was so fucking strong. And the fact that she's winning an Oscar, getting nominations in between, Cena supporting two franchises, the X-Men movies start to warp themselves around. Right, we all remember that Mystique is the leader.

33:59Alison Willmore:Everyone, yes, the best known and most famous X-Men.

34:03David Sims:Of course, the whole time. Like, there's the insane thing when you watch Days of Future Past where they're like, this movie needs to have her as ostensibly the lead character, but also her scheduling is impossible because she's doing Hunger Games. So she needs to have the primary plot thread where she's also on her own and we can shoot her separate from everyone else.

34:25Alison Willmore:But also they're like, we've got this incredibly famous actor. And also this character is blue all the time. Like we need to figure out ways that she's not in like full body makeup. Barely.

34:36Griffin Newman:Right. The fact that the first one is like, you need to be blue because that's like your true self. Right. And then in the other one, she's like, yeah, but I'm not going to do that much. But like, no one. I'm mostly going to like be 70s.

34:51David Sims:I feel like the response at the time was like, yeah, smart. build your movie around Jennifer Lawrence. People weren't like, oh, they're shoving her down our throats. And so then there's the thing of like passengers like squeaks to 98 million or whatever. Yeah.

35:05Griffin Newman:It was a flop. It is a flop. It was sort of like, right, like less embarrassing than it could have been because it's sort of made, but I mean, it probably made international money. I think so too. We're just doing a Jennifer Lawrence thing.

35:18David Sims:I think it's important. You get to a point there where they're like, okay, but if her in a turkey still gets to 90 something, and obviously that movie costs too much, then making Red Sparrow for 40 or 60 or making Mother for like 40 or 50 still makes sense. And I think there was this belief of like, is she just the one person that her audience will auto buy a ticket? They will follow her anywhere. And even if Mother isn't going to make $100 million, maybe it makes 50. And instead, it's just like, no, she's making things that are like unpleasant to watch. you know often by design it feels like that was the phase she was going through

35:57Griffin Newman:and testing it she's made one pleasant to watch movie and like before that you know the movies she made were hunger games david or russell movies and x-men movies none of which are light and you know fluffy no i mean x-men and hunger games are

36:15David Sims:both she's made one franchise is about oppression fun movie in her entire career you would say no

36:20Griffin Newman:no hard feelings. Like, obviously, X-Men movies are fun. Like, Hunger Games movies, I mean, they are fun, I suppose, but like, they're pretty dark. They're dark. Yeah. Like, I really think that's the, I mean, Don't Look Up is a comedy, but it's a comedy that bugs you out. It's also just like,

36:36Alison Willmore:really not fun.

36:37David Sims:She's like, the angry character in the movie too. She's playing the least fun of anybody. I think that's why there was so much hope around no hard feelings is like, wait, you're telling me it's Jennifer Lawrence press interview, the movie, that part of her power was this like, oh my God, she's this powerhouse dramatic actress. She can do action and she can like do the dialogue. And then we see her in interviews and she's funnier than comedians, you know? And people, I think, liked the contrast between the two. But then the hope was, if you let her be funny in a movie, is that just going to explode the box office?

37:16Alison Willmore:But we hate comedy now. We just don't. That's the problem.

37:20Griffin Newman:Yeah. I think she's probably happy enough with the hard feelings. I think if she looked at anyone but you, she might have the thought of like, oh, should I have done a rom-com with a really sort of established, handsome actor guy rather than a silly guy?

37:38David Sims:I think she would have killed it. Can you fucking imagine? That's actually upsetting to run the simulation.

37:44Griffin Newman:But she should be happy with the hard feelings, which is a better movie than anyone but you and did pretty good.

37:48David Sims:I also contend, and I felt this way at the time, No Hard Feelings comes out like June and then goes to Netflix very quickly. It's on the service by like September or October and immediately kind of explodes on Netflix. And I do feel like anyone but you got a bump from that. I was seeing so much social media FOMO of oh fuck there was a good comedy three months ago and we didn't go that Sony marketing you know both of those movies kind of capitalized upon well don't miss this one

38:18Alison Willmore:I would like to see her in just a full romantic comedy yeah you know I think that'd be interesting yeah yeah I mean she's kind of steered away you know in Causeway she's her that's like a platonic romance almost like her character is gay it's a sweet movie yeah you know and then No Hard Feelings is like you know kind of spout and once again yes

38:42David Sims:Lynn Ramsey's Die My Love on paper is offering hey do you want to just see Robert Pattinson and Jennifer Lawrence go insane right

38:59David

39:00David Sims:what this episode don't act so surprised because it's a it's a familiar friend oh okay This episode's brought to you by MUBI. Yawn.

39:07Griffin Newman:Just kidding. Comfortable. Secure. We love them. They are a global film company of champions grade cinema. Iconic directors. Emerging auteurs. Always something new to discover with MUBI. Each and every film hand-selected. So you can explore the best of cinema. Nothing more to say, I guess. Wrong! There's a new film coming to theaters. Movie theaters. February 13th. 13th, the first Nigerian film ever in official competition again. That's pretty wild. This is a film by Akinola Davis called My Father's Shadow. It was BAFTA-nominated, poetic, tender portrait of a father-son bond framed within the political landscape of 1993 Lagos in Nigeria.

39:48Griffin Newman:It is about a father and two young sons as they journey into and around the vibrantly rendered Nigerian metropolis, reckoning with their relationship, navigating the city that's in the middle of a democratic crisis written by real life brothers, Akinola Davis Jr. and Wally Davis. Love it, brothers. Co-wrote this groundbreaking feature debut. And you've got Sofei Dorisu. Oh, from Slow Horses. I love him. I hope I'm saying his name right. But he's a really good actor and he's the star. It's worth seeing. It's in theaters, Griffin. It's great to go to a theater.

40:25David Sims:It's in theaters. We love that Mubi puts Mubis in theaters before ultimately ending up on their wonderful platform. Dang right. I'm just looking at some of the stuff they got right now. Die My Love, of course. Yeah. An important watch, a necessary watch for any blankie. La Grazia, the new Paolo Sorrentino movie, which I missed in theaters. Good moment to catch up with it. The Great Shall We Dance. Oh, the classic? The original. Oh, my goodness. That's fun. Like a restoration? Yeah, and look what they got a collection called Heartthrob Nicholas Cage. It's Young Dreamy Cage. Well, still dreamy to me.

41:04Hey, you're very open-hearted.

41:06Griffin Newman:Anyway, to stream the best of cinema, you can try Mubi free for 30 days at Mubi.com slash blank check. That's M-U-B-I dot com slash blank check for a whole month of great cinema for free. And then go see My Father's Shadow in theaters. Please, thank you for listening. Thank you. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

41:22David Sims:Thank you. Very kind.

41:33Griffin Newman:Let's talk about Die My Love, which is a movie I like. I know you like it, Griff. Allison?

41:38Alison Willmore:I like it. Yes. I think I feel like it feels unmodulated to me. It does feel like it starts at a place, it's so high already, and then kind of just keeps going. It barrels right off a cliff, you know? But I do think she's incredible in it.

41:53David Sims:I, I, I, it grew for me a lot on second viewing. And I think I struggled a little bit on the first time liking, not loving, being like, I guess this has to be my default bottom Lynn just because every other one is kind of totally knocked me out. And I think I, I don't know. I have a read on all of that that made it work a little more for me this time. I do want to, in this miniseries that we're now finishing on, Lynn Ramsey called We Need to Pod About Cast Fin. introduce our producer Ben Hosley because I feel there is a need to get this out of the way. What's up? From the moment I saw this movie in theaters, I was like, this movie has the number one scene designed to turn Ben Hosley off I have ever seen in a film.

42:36Griffin Newman:Yeah, it's when she shoots the dog. Yeah.

42:38David Sims:I just could not think of a thing that would auto-block Ben more than lead character of the movie shoots a dog and you have to sit with it for the second half of the film.

42:47Griffin Newman:Yeah, it happens pretty early too. Yep, like halfway through. The way I feel about that in the same, you know, any movie that has violence against children or animals is you're always kind of like, you really have to earn this. Like, I'm not mad. Like, on principle, you can depict things, I understand. But I do have this kind of just sort of like, are you just trying to provoke me or put me in a mood? Now, granted, the dog is incredibly annoying.

43:18Alison Willmore:Yeah, that's a real asshole of a dog. Yeah. But yeah, I know as a dog owner, it is difficult for me to to watch that. I do feel like the thing that Robert Pattinson's character does, which is to show up and be like, I got a dog. You're going to take care of it is like one of the worst things you can possibly do to a partner. It is.

43:36David Sims:I mean, yes. Yes. The movie is playing with something which is like it is actually designing a perfect anti save the cat. Right. Like it is going against every rule.

43:46Griffin Newman:That's what I'm saying. Right. Like, are you just doing this to do that? To have, like, this spike in the movie that will kind of, like, really set me, you know, in a certain mood? I think so. I think it's less about, like... It's like when John Wick's dog dies, then I'm like, right, well, he should kill all those people. It's different. You're like, he needs to kill all the people now.

44:05David Sims:The rule is, if you kill an animal, everyone's going to be upset unless that is used as motivation for vengeance and the audience feels like there's catharsis and justice, right? Like, Save the Cat is less about, like, stupid, imposed lines of Hollywood thinking and more just actually an understanding of human psychology of most people will just clock out of your movie after this point. And I think it is less that it does the shocking thing just to get a shock out of you and more does the shocking thing to say, and now what is your relationship to this character? Because we're not moving on from them and this is not a dream sequence and you have to live with this.

44:42David Sims:And to a certain degree, you're like held hostage by her in the same way that he is, right? If you're in a relationship and someone shoots your dog, you're like, I think we're breaking up.

44:57Griffin Newman:Yeah, I would. I mean, I have never had a dog, but yeah, I think I would have some notes for that person. I think it's a pretty short conversation. I think it's crossing a line for me where the fact that they then go on as she continues to cross so many more lines until someone finally intervenes. Right. It's pretty wild.

45:17Alison Willmore:Yeah. I mean, I think this is the challenge of this movie is that it sits in her experience so thoroughly, right? And to the point where you're like not sure what's real or what's not sometimes, right? Like the motorcyclist neighbor who shows up for a while, you're like, is that real? Like, is that really a person? Like before you see that he's Lakeith, he's just like in a helmet, like a kind of like music video figure or something.

45:41Griffin Newman:I thought it was like mental illness. Exactly.

45:44David Sims:Like looming in the distance. To be fair, like Lakeith Stanfield as a figure does kind of represent that.

45:50Alison Willmore:But you know, like the way like that whole thread is handled, there's a long stretch where you're like, I cannot tell how much of this is just in her head.

45:58David Sims:No, and even when you have the scene in the parking lot, you cannot tell what you're supposed to take away from that.

46:03Alison Willmore:Yeah. I mean, did we ever fully? No. No. But I think with the dog or with Robert Pattinson's character, his name I'm forgetting. What is his name?

46:13Griffin Newman:His name is Jackson. Oh, Jackson. Okay.

46:17Alison Willmore:So with Jackson, and I think like the question you might have throughout of just like, why is he still around? And also, why does he, after a lot of these things happen, be like, let's get married? You know, is that I feel like we just never, we're so deep in her perspective that we don't actually get a sense of what she might be like from the outside, you know, like, like, like. Yeah, this is interesting.

46:39David Sims:I mean, A, I think, you know, what I was saying about like dog killing being a bit of a deal breaker in relationships, it's like this person has a child with this woman. So there is like a sense of. You can't just be like, Jesus, you're too much enough. Yeah, right. Right. For a guy who is a character who certainly is not good at expressing himself or working through things or feels like he's really good at engaging with the severity of things, there is like a struggle to calculate like, well, even if I perceive this woman to be like a physical threat to my child, what do I do? Is, you know, having her institutionalize the move, is moving away from her the move?

47:23David Sims:like all of these things have like eternal ripple effects on the health of this child, whether you remove her from the equation or keep her close. There's like pluses and minuses. And you're like, but now he has like witnessed her do a thing that he's never going to be able to get past. Right. It is it is an act that much like the way it stays with the audience. You're just like, he can't process that. He's never going to be like, well, that was a bad day. Right. Like there is like a core trauma there. He's never going to be able to move past. And I think in terms of like, where is this line? Why are they allowing it to happen?

47:57David Sims:Why does he then decide to get married to her? There's a thing that I found very informative with this movie, which is like it's based on a book. The book is very much about like how much is in this person's head psychosis in a postpartum depressive state.

48:11Griffin Newman:It's also not set in Montana.

48:14David Sims:No. Set in France. Right. But it's the idea of being isolated and losing a grip on reality. That character is not a writer. And yeah, there were a lot of changes made. We'll open the dossier in a moment and get into all of this. And it is offered to Lynne Ramsey. And she goes like, I feel like I did my version of a postpartum movie with Kevin. Sure. Do I want to repeat this? Although she did that before she had children. Well, that's A. And B, I think she's like, okay, is there a different in for me on this story? And she keeps saying in interviews, I didn't see this as a postpartum movie. I saw this as an opportunity to make a mad love story.

48:52David Sims:And when I read that, I was like, what is that? And what I think she's saying is literally that it is a movie about falling in love with someone who is severely mentally ill. It is a movie about getting in too deep in a relationship with someone where, you know, in your 20s, a lot of things, people you know, who are really engaging and charismatic and have like exciting personalities start to experience significant breakdowns in their late 20s and 30s. And you realize these are traits of latent mental illness. And the exact things that make someone like Jennifer Lawrence seem like this is the most exciting girl in the world, you keep wanting to excuse things.

49:31David Sims:And the further the signs present themselves, the more there's a sunk cost fallacy of to accept this at this moment is to look back on everything and invalidate it. And this guy is just trying so hard to be like, what will reset her back to three years ago? So, you know, there's clearly a thing. And I think this movie's failing is it doesn't totally dramatize his character correctly. I think this movie would connect more if it could find a way to explain his point of view a little more. But I think it's just how can I deny that I was wrong about this person or the sense that this person is gone?

50:15David Sims:And what can I do to try to get them back?

50:19Alison Willmore:I think that's a great point. Though I think that...

50:21David Sims:Especially now that there's a baby in the mix. Sure.

50:23Alison Willmore:So I think the idea of being like this... Like telling that story, but telling it from her perspective is what is so disorienting about this movie. Because it is like, to be like, this is a movie about loving someone who is like having... Who is spiraling out in a way that they're probably not going to recover from. But also you're going to see it from the point of view of the person spiraling out. But also I think his character... And I understand why. because if he were too sympathetic or too responsible, you would just totally lose her, right? Like, you can't just be like, why doesn't he dump her?

50:57Alison Willmore:But like - They talked about in the book,

50:59David Sims:he's way more of an oaf. Yeah. They were like, we wanted to make him more emotionally engaged, you know? Yeah. Even if he's not 100 % able to, yeah.

51:07Alison Willmore:At the same time though, he like, he does, yeah, he comes and he's like, I got a dog. And then is like, and then he's like clearly, yeah, like, and then also, remember there's that scene where he's like, we need to talk, leave the baby behind.

51:20David Sims:Yes, insane.

51:21Alison Willmore:And wrestles her into the car and drives her off. Like that, you know, like for all that you're like, there is a lot, there are legitimate reasons why some of these characters would worry about the baby. Though like, she is also like, always very careful with the baby. You know, even when she is like, walking off into the woods, she never, there's never a question like within our perspective that she is, she is like, not caring. There's the knife

51:44Griffin Newman:in the beginning. Right, but like, that's like,

51:46Alison Willmore:like, I don't know.

51:48Griffin Newman:She gets quite close.

51:49Alison Willmore:I feel like she has never. With the knife to the baby. Even the movie also, like, there's that point where she's like, the one thing that works is like the baby, right? Like that, like she even says as much at a certain point.

51:58Griffin Newman:I sort of eventually realized, right, the baby was not really going to be in danger. Problem in danger. Yes.

52:05Alison Willmore:Yeah. But she is a danger to herself.

52:08Griffin Newman:She's more a danger to herself. Nonetheless.

52:10Alison Willmore:Yes.

52:11Griffin Newman:You know.

52:12Alison Willmore:Yeah. But yeah, like, I mean, it is interesting that like it puts in these scenes where Pattinson is the one who is like, Jackson is the one who is careless about childcare.

52:21Griffin Newman:This is a problem I had with Night Bitch, a worse movie that nobody remembers. Mario Heller's Night Bitch.

52:27David Sims:But a movie I was thinking about a lot during this rewatch because there is so much overlap between the two of them and sort of the bigger ideas. Exactly. Did you see Night Bitch?

52:38Alison Willmore:I never saw Night Bitch.

52:39David Sims:Night Bitch coming. That's a bit from two years ago.

52:42Griffin Newman:It has the same sort of plot of like, we're with this mother who is struggling. Obviously, my bitch is very much a postpartum movie that's about her struggling with like how her body has changed and blah, blah, blah, blah. But the husband's there and seems like, not like a complete dolt, but also like kind of careless and like not very emotionally. Scoot McNary as a bit of a well-intentioned back. Where he's like, I want to play Xbox. And I was just kind of like, I think he has to be stupider or smarter. Like, I just think like the guy you're showing me, I think would be a little more on like that his wife is turning into a dog.

53:20Griffin Newman:Like he needs to be dumber, like or something.

53:23David Sims:I agree that it is the fundamental Achilles heel of this movie, Die My Love, is that exact problem where the two times I've seen it, I'm like Pattinson either needs to be significantly smarter or significantly dumber. And I have seen him play both incredibly well many times. I know he has that range part of it's also the problem is he's so interesting and so hot he is that he needs to make a stronger choice

53:46Alison Willmore:yeah yeah right

53:47Griffin Newman:the problem is that if he's too dumb then it's about being married to a dumbass right and that's not what it's right and then it's just like

53:56Alison Willmore:and then I think it becomes something that the movie

53:57Griffin Newman:and if he's too smart then you're like why the fuck isn't he just like yeah well the movie doesn't want to

54:02Alison Willmore:it kind of takes a lot of pains to reject the idea of being like oh it's so awful like I'm trapped in this marriage to this like just to this useless slob, right? Yes. He is highly imperfect, but you have sympathy for him as well.

54:15Griffin Newman:Right. It's also not a story about moving to Montana making you crazy, but they have moved to Montana and she is going crazy.

54:22Alison Willmore:Yeah. And or about feeling like you can't express yourself creatively. I mean, we never really learn about her writing at all. The writing is almost this asterisk of being like it symbolizes something she can't do anymore, potentially related to her mental health.

54:36Griffin Newman:But you're right once in a very abstract way. Spreading some ink.

54:41Alison Willmore:Oh, right. Yeah.

54:43Griffin Newman:As well as some milk. Some fluids.

54:45Alison Willmore:Yeah.

54:46Griffin Newman:I mean, it's new. It's different.

54:48Alison Willmore:It's true. It's fresh. It's on the paper. It's very fresh.

54:51David Sims:It's very fresh. I'm sorry. No, no. I agree that that's the thing holding this movie back from greatness for me. and the thing that puts it at the bottom of the pile for me is, you know, I think the Pattinson character is kind of operating from a belief that this is a postpartum thing. I understand that I don't understand this. Maybe I just didn't know it was going to be this extreme. And this will end. We will get to the other side of it, right? And I think a lot of this movie is about the rejection of there is something larger here. postpartum has possibly broken a dam of many, many issues. And, you know, all the women around her are sort of like going like, yeah, I had like a night bitch phase too.

55:43David Sims:Anyway, now I know how to wear clothes. You know, like I used to scream and throw knives. Anyway, now it's six months later and I'm a little bit OK. And you just got to like shove it down. And everyone is sort of saying this kind of like Stepford YV like, yeah, you just suck it up and no men want to hear your problems. and you get through it.

56:02Alison Willmore:I think they're also kinder about it, right? Yeah, they're not being assholes about it. It's like, can I help you? Can I please do anything?

56:10David Sims:We have to stick together because they don't understand what's going on with us. But also in saying that to her, they don't understand what's going on with her. And I think to her, that being communicated also feels like you're telling me there's more of this. You know, like this is not reassuring.

56:34David?

56:35David Sims:What?

56:35Griffin Newman:Dunno. Oh, boy. Dunno. Oh, his legendary and very old composer, John Williams. It was just his birthday. I know, and he was celebrated.

56:46David Sims:He is the man who tried to warn us about the sharks. He said, here is their theme song. If you hear them... It's two notes. Right. If you hear those two notes, suit up, get safe, hit dry land, because it's scary to swim in open waters when there's a risk of a shark attack. And even scarier is going online without ExpressVPN.

57:09Griffin Newman:Would you say that's like scuba diving

57:11David Sims:in a suit made of meat? Yes, it's not. It's even worse than scuba diving in your birthday suit. It's scuba diving in a meat suit. It's begging people to attack you.

57:20Griffin Newman:I would say just for me personally, my birthday suit is a suit made of meat. I got it made for a birthday one time.

57:26David Sims:Okay, that's a birthday suit, not your birthday suit. The real lesson here is that, thank God Lady Gaga didn't go for a swim after the Grammys that one year. That one time when she was in the meet. Remember that? And thank God Express VPN exists to keep you safe while surfing the World Wide Web. Exactly.

57:45Griffin Newman:This is all a metaphor, but when you think about it, when you're connecting to an unencrypted network, say you're in a hotel or a cafe, an airport, so on and so forth, your online data is not secure. There are sharks, a.k.a. hackers, trying to steal your personal data. It doesn't take much technical knowledge to do it. Just some cheap hardware is needed. Your daily data is valuable. They can make a thousand a person selling it on the dark web. So ExpressVPN, listen, I have some stuff to tell you about it. I can't wait to hear it. It's at its lowest price ever. Prices start at$3.49 a month. That's 12 cents a day.

58:17David Sims:12 cents a day.

58:19Griffin Newman:That's me flicking a 12 pence at you. A 12 pence? It would take a hacker with a supercomputer over a billion years to get past ExpressVPN encryption. And it's easy to use. You fire it up. You click one button. You get protected. That's it. It's been rated number one by top tech reviewers like CNET and The Verge.

58:38David Sims:I'm going to go on a limb and say that one billion years is longer than the average life expectancy for a hacker. I'm going to say most of them will not succeed in getting there. So I use it. It's on my phone.

58:51Griffin Newman:It's on my laptop. I have it on my laptop. Yep. Yep. Clicky. Easy. Because I don't know how any of this works. I'm confused by it. It's scary. I'm an old man when it comes to VPNs. I like how simple it is to use. And you too can secure your online data today by visiting expressvpn.com slash check. That's expressvpn.com slash check to find out how you can get up to four extra months. Expressvpn.com slash check. expressvpn.com slash check. I did it right. I just... You did it right. Believe in yourself. Letters.

59:21David Sims:Yeah, and happy birthday, Johnny Williams.

59:30David Sims:David! What? Do you know what that was? Roadrunner. Motivation.

59:36Griffin Newman:That's how quickly it comes and goes, baby. I felt like it was more like a Roadrunner, like the cartoon.

59:42David Sims:Yeah, but Roadrunners come and go. They go, F1. Here's another impression I have.

59:47Alison Willmore:Ding dong.

59:49David Sims:That's not a ding dong. That's my impression of bad habits. You're right about that. They show up even when you don't feel like it.

59:58Griffin Newman:I thought you just meant that it's a bad habit that you lean on a ding dong for ad reads sometimes. No, that's a good habit.

1:00:03David Sims:That's smart business strategy. And AG1 is the easiest habit that you can start now. Wow. To support consistency even when motivation isn't perfect. All parts of this ad are really speaking to me right now, especially in February. The month that sucks. When January motivation dips and winter routines need a reset. I added the month that sucks in. That was not in the copy. But let me be clear. Despite being my birthday month, it's empirically the worst month.

1:00:33Griffin Newman:It's a pretty tough one.

1:00:35David Sims:It's a month for losers. Clearly what's getting you past is that little scoop of green powder. Kind of the only thing that's getting me through. See, most supplements overcomplicate things with tons of pills and confusing timing an impossible schedule to maintain long-term. But AG1 simplifies your nutrition. Multivitamin, pre and probiotics, superfoods and antioxidants all in one scoop. It's an easy daily reset that brings foundational nutrition no matter what your schedule throws at you. Can you confirm some things for me?

1:01:08Griffin Newman:Yes. Does it take 20 seconds to put one scoop into eight ounces of water? If even that. If even, you're saying you've got down to 15?

1:01:17David Sims:They call me Fast Hands Griffey Nooms for a reason.

1:01:19Griffin Newman:What do you stir it with? The scooper. That was my question. You don't use it in a different stirrer. Or if you get the starter kit, they give you the shaker bottle.

1:01:29David Sims:I get very, you know, I want a good stirrer. Then you can do that. Okay. You got options. Ask me other questions.

1:01:35Griffin Newman:The new next gen formula, does it have more vitamins and minerals than ever clinically proven? Obviously, bro. Obviously. How about like some energy support? B vitamins. Need it. Superfoods. Absolutely. Chalk full. Now, you don't, everyone already knows this, but you use this every single day. Correct. Right. And your favorite flavor is, I know you like to rotate, but is it still citrus?

1:01:59David Sims:Yes.

1:01:59Griffin Newman:I'm a citrus boy. But they've got the berry. They do. They've got the tropical. Oh boy, do they. They've got original.

1:02:06David Sims:Original.

1:02:06Griffin Newman:And sometimes nothing hits like a classic. AG1 has over 50 ,000 verified five-star reviews and comes with a 90-day money-back guarantee. For a limited time only, go to drinkag1.com slash check to get a free AG1 flavor sampler and AGZ sampler to try all the flavors. Plus free vitamin D3 plus K2 and AG1 welcome kit with your first AG1 subscription order. This is a limited time offer only available while supplies last. That's drinkag1.com slash check. Drinkag1.com slash check.

1:02:45Griffin Newman:Can we crack open the dossier, Mr. Sims? So, you never really hear. Came out eight years prior. You know, once again, she has a long gaffe between projects.

1:02:55David Sims:There's pandemic and such. There are many projects that come close to happening. Well, I'll tell you something. One is a Civil War movie called Call Black Horse starring Casey Affleck.

1:03:06Griffin Newman:Okay. Nothing else has ever surfaced about that one. Zero ways that could go wrong. she says she wrote 160 pages of a script that is an epic environmental horror thing nothing's ever really come of that one either she signed on with Village Roadshow at one point to direct the Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon which is a Stephen King novel like a not not Stephen with a PH not Stephen with a PH? No it is Stephen with a PH so JJ actually fucked up. I wrote his name wrong. JJ, walk into the burning woods. Yeah. She apparently once, George A. Romero had been sort of tasked with making that. She wrote a screenplay for that.

1:03:52Griffin Newman:It's about a hike on the Appalachian Trail, a girl listening to the radio. She gets lost in the woods. Sounds sort of interesting. Nothing has ever come up. The two big ones are a film called Polaris, which has long been in development, long attached to Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara, about an ice photographer that's set at the turn of the century. She says it's a passion project.

1:04:18David Sims:No, we don't know. That is the one because I have sort of wanted to do her as soon as she made a new film. Most years until this year, there was a... Maybe Polaris is filming in a couple months? There was an erroneous account in Variety that it had wrapped production. That was the thing that really fucked us up. Because then people were like, Like, are there two Lynn Ramsey movies in the can? That is simply just not true. No, it's simply not true. And it was just a mistake. But it always kind of felt like that was closest to happening. And then this movie leapfrogged.

1:04:48Griffin Newman:The other thing was Stone Mattress, an adaptation of a short story from a Margaret Atwood collection.

1:04:56David Sims:There was also erroneous reporting because she had been attached to Stone Mattress.

1:05:01Griffin Newman:So that was going to have Julianne Moore and Sandra Oh and be set on a ship.

1:05:05David Sims:Right.

1:05:06Griffin Newman:Yes.

1:05:06David Sims:I feel like there was also a point where it came out in some interview, oh, Jennifer Lawrence and Lynn Brams, you're working something. And then people erroneously spread that it was Jennifer Lawrence has signed on to Stone Mattress. Yeah.

1:05:20Griffin Newman:This movie came up a little... They would have had to shoot it in Greenland. Typical. Yeah. And they struggled to... I mean, it's hard to, you know, set a movie like that up. She also floated working on a TV show, a TV series that never happened. And anyway, as we know with Die My Love, what happens is Martin Scorsese, who has a book club, which has unnamed film directors who read books with their eyes towards adapting them. I don't know who's in this club. No.

1:05:47David Sims:I'm guessing it's probably him and a couple X-Men directors. He read... What does the term mean now?

1:05:53Griffin Newman:Griffin's made it very flexible. He read Die My Love. Yeah. Written by Ariana Harwich, I think, Argentinian writer. found it to be a powerful mosaic of the mind and handed it to Jennifer Lawrence. He had liked Mother, and he basically said, like, I think she can pull this off. Apparently, you know, he had come to her once before. Our friend Gia, who's on this podcast, in the profile, said that, like, apparently Kate Chopin's novel, The Awakening, had been something that Scorsese brought to Lawrence, but nothing happened.

1:06:26David Sims:It felt like, right, he's had his eye out for her she's wanted to work with him they're in communication he will send her books that he thinks there's something in that could fit with her

1:06:38Griffin Newman:Lawrence decides that she's always wanted to work with Rillian Ramsey said I've wanted to work with her my entire adult life and sent her the novel directly and they email for about six months about being moms and other things Ramsey's a little as you say wary because she's kind of like I already did we need to talk about Kevin but you know a major movie star is trying to work with her and is handing her something.

1:07:00David Sims:Ramsey also was like, hey, I don't want to make that. I'd rather make this. And Lawrence was like, this is the movie I want to make.

1:07:06Griffin Newman:Lawrence was persistent and so Ramsey had to be somewhat won over but she kind of fucked with the story, turned into more of a love story according to Ramsey.

1:07:16David Sims:Yes. May I read this quote I found that I thought was interesting that Jennifer Lawrence gave to IndieWire. She said, you know, Scorsese hands her the book says you should do this. and Lawrence's quote is I sat with it for a while and then once it all clicked that it isn't a literal adaptation that it's more poetic then I realized Lynn Ramsey was the only person that we could conceive of making it because she's the only poet I know of that makes movies. There you go. And so part of wanting her to make it was being like I want you to interpret this how you want. I think when Lynn is like I don't know is this too similar this book she's just like you figure out your version of it that's what I want to do.

1:07:56David Sims:But it feels like there's a lot of empowering of I want to be in whatever version of this you want to make.

1:08:03Griffin Newman:So Ramsey says, I want to put humor in there. I want it to be a love story. She says something that I think is a little silly, which is the whole postpartum thing is just bullshit. It's not about that. It's about a relationship breaking down. It's about love breaking down and sex breaking down after having a baby. After having a baby is what postpartum. So it is a postpartum movie, but okay, Lynn Ramsey.

1:08:25David Sims:I think she just is probably reacting to how much that was reduced to the logline of the movie. Sure. Yeah.

1:08:32Griffin Newman:I think Jennifer Lawrence is very much like, this is my Jenner Rowlands movie. Yes. This is me being Cassavetes. Yeah.

1:08:39David Sims:And an interesting thing, she has two children. She talks about, she's talked about a lot in the press for this movie, that she did not have a difficult postpartum experience, mentally and emotionally after her first child. She had a tough one after her second. When she films this movie, She is like less than three months pregnant, which is how they're able to do things like the breast, like lactation, like practically. And, you know, by being in her early stages of pregnancy, she's physically more believable as someone who's like recently given birth. She's making this movie being like, this is pure just acting for me.

1:09:12David Sims:This is like fucking Jenna Rollins. This is going off. This is exploration. I'm not pulling for anything in my own experience. Then she wraps this film. She has a second child. She has a really tough postpartum experience there. Lynn Ramsey edits for a while. She goes to see the movie at Cannes and she breaks down crying. And she's like, I was representing a thing I hadn't experienced that I'm now watching and is speaking to me. It's just kind of a fascinating... I don't know. Catching her at that moment.

1:09:42Griffin Newman:It is interesting. It's interesting that she made this while she was pregnant. I think it was a pain in the ass. Probably. Lynn decides to move the action to Montana. I mean, she wasn't going to make it in France, right? I guess that makes sense. And she never really met the author until after the movie was a can. So she didn't really delve with the author on what it's about.

1:10:03David Sims:And she gets the Disco Pigs guy to adapt it?

1:10:05Griffin Newman:So two people. Edna Walsh, who's a playwright. He's the guy who wrote small things like these. Is he the Disco Pigs guy? I think so. Am I wrong about this? I don't know.

1:10:16David Sims:Let me look it up. Okay, well, let me look it up.

1:10:18Griffin Newman:Yeah, yeah. He's the guy who wrote the play Disco Pigs way back in the day. which was Killian Murphy's launchpad yeah as both play and movie and then Alice Birch who wrote Lady Macbeth and then worked on succession and stuff like basically was brought in as a script editor like as they're in final weeks of prep and Lynn was like you did the work you should have a credit too so they all there's why there's three credits Pattinson said the first draft was funnier maybe and then like and the husband was sort of just a device in the book. Like, he's just useless. And my character was kind of like that in the first draft, but then, like, it's sort of beefed up with every draft.

1:11:00Griffin Newman:Sure.

1:11:01David Sims:Mm-hmm.

1:11:02Griffin Newman:I mean, it did. I mean, he's got stuff to do.

1:11:05David Sims:They got, like, 30 to 40 % of the way there to a character is what I find frustrating. Um, yep.

1:11:13Alison Willmore:Yeah. I mean, he's just, we see him through her eyes so clearly. Yeah. Like, it's so clearly a subjective experience of him that it's hard to, yeah.

1:11:21David Sims:There's a lot of stuff I can infer, but it's still hard to kind of make sense of what he's doing on a scene to scene basis. I can kind of like zoom out and go. Anyway, go on.

1:11:33Alison Willmore:I mean, like the cheating, right? Like you're like, how much of this is her channeling her own frustrations and her own feelings of like her like sexual frustration, her feelings about her body and how much of it is like, yes, there are condoms in there. And I'm like, I don't know.

1:11:47David Sims:Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I feel like Ramsey makes a real choice to establish a pattern of him looking at women and looking at women who you have to imagine are similar to Jennifer Lawrence when he met her. You know, there's sort of the alternative girl who is the waitress at the diner and the two girls on the beach and sort of like, you know, who has this kind of like rough energy in their mid 20s that maybe he's now on the business end of and is longing for again. But right. You don't really get any larger allusions to, you know, he's he's texting someone under the table or whatever.

1:12:29Griffin Newman:No. and he's also hot. You would feel jealous and crazy because he's a good looking guy. Like you're just kind of like, well,

1:12:35Alison Willmore:I'm sure people are interested in you. Unspecified job.

1:12:38Griffin Newman:You know, You know, Lynn, as she's, Lawrence says Lynn is very emotionally led, not controlling, crazy, you know, they do these sort of rehearsals where you're kind of just like, you know, exploring the space and being weird and right, like, you know, a lot of stuff comes out of that.

1:12:56David Sims:Yeah. And, you know, Pattinson, like, who I think is fairly studious as an actor and trying to prepare things.

1:13:03Griffin Newman:Pattinson, I've been told, right, is a very serious rehearser who struggles with... It was Eggers who told me long ago, this is the lighthouse, with Willem Dafoe being more like, let's go crazy in this scene. Right. And Pattinson was like, oh, fuck, but I really got the voice down and I've been working on this scene really hard. But then I assume, he's done a lot of work since then where I assume, again, he had to kind of adjust.

1:13:29David Sims:Lighthouse is an interesting comparison point because you're like, that's kind of, in theory, what should be the juice of casting him here is placing him into an unstructured environment with an actor who is so famously instinctive, you know, instead of intellectual and then having him struggle with an environment that he can't figure out the framework of. And I feel like Lighthouse gets that, like he channels his frustration into the character. He's great in that. which is the primary thing he needs to do. And he has the more

1:13:59Griffin Newman:tough role. Exactly. Yeah.

1:14:01David Sims:Right. And they don't quite land on it here, but he tells the story about there being like a five-page dialogue scene that he worked really hard on, that he is like a real like fucking like notes in the margin of the page kind of guy. And they got to set and Lin's like, I think we do this without words. And he was like, which part? And she was like, all five pages. And he was like, I guess this is just what this is. Yeah, I guess this is

1:14:24Griffin Newman:the process here. I would be annoyed. I would be bitter. different people work different ways. Pattinson had never really met Jennifer Lawrence before, but it always wanted to work with her. They were chatting about something and she was like, do you want to be my husband in this Lynn Ramsey movie? This is how he puts it. Pattinson is notoriously someone who kind of like massages the truth on press force because he gets bored. Unreliable narrator. What are you talking about?

1:14:50David Sims:Didn't like a clown shoot his dad or something?

1:14:53Griffin Newman:No, that's Shia LaBeouf.

1:14:55Alison Willmore:The cooking things, right? Where he invents weird cooking things? Yeah.

1:15:00Griffin Newman:But he claims that Jennifer kind of offered it to him somewhat casually because he was kind of like, why are there no cool jobs? And she's like, how about this? Makes sort of sense because it's like, this is not the kind of movie you package with two stars. It is a Jennifer Lawrence movie. And he is certainly playing a supporting role. But he seemed to have a good time. He's a very game actor. I love him in so many things. I like him in this. I walked out with very little to say about Robert Patton.

1:15:31Alison Willmore:Yeah, I mean, he's good at playing kind of like slightly unreliable or disappointing, like that aura. I think he's good at conjuring. But yeah, it is like, it is like you said,

1:15:41David Sims:it is like 40 % of a character. Here's what I think they're trying to get at with this character, right? I was like watching it a second time, the opening of the house, right? And then walking into it. And one of the first things he says is like, I could record music in here. and you're like, okay, so, and he's talking about his childhood memories of the things that happened. They are inheriting his uncle's house. They are moving back to his hometown closer to his parents. His father played by, I don't know this actor. I didn't, I've never seen this guy before. He's kind of got just like a generic everyman vibe, voice, I think he's a non-professional.

1:16:20David Sims:They just found him. They just found a guy. He's like a Kevin O 'Leary, right? Nick Nolte on fucking fire in a tiny role, but I think he is like devastating in this movie. It is such an impactful like two minutes or whatever it is. Couple scenes. Yeah. Is it just one or? No, it's a couple scenes. It's basically

1:16:37Alison Willmore:the scene in the woods as well.

1:16:38David Sims:The scene in the house that's extended

1:16:39Griffin Newman:and the scene in the woods. How much Nolte has there been late?

1:16:43Alison Willmore:Not much.

1:16:44Griffin Newman:Yeah, what's the last? I mean, he was in two. He was a thing called The Golden Voice, which. I got a golden voice. Yeah, I can't say I know much about. Three. and then it's three years ago he was in the Josh Duhamel movie Blackout.

1:16:58David Sims:Of course.

1:16:59Griffin Newman:And two years before that. I mean like yeah he's barely done anything. Yeah. Like

1:17:04David Sims:He is now uh do do do do do 85 years old? That's old?

1:17:14Griffin Newman:Yeah. I mean he's been around a long time but I mean like I was trying to think like what's the last Poker Face. Poker Face is the thing. Oh sure. I knew there was something

1:17:20David Sims:in the last couple years I thought he was great in. Yes that was TV that I loved he was great in. But he's got his spotlight episode of Poker Face. And of course, we all enjoyed him in The Mandalorian,

1:17:27Griffin Newman:but I think that was just a voice.

1:17:28David Sims:What are you talking about? I'm in the costume. I'm pulling a dwarf. I'm on my knees playing an Ugnaught.

1:17:36Griffin Newman:I love the Poker Face episode. Where he was very good. He plays Full Tippet, basically.

1:17:42David Sims:And have you watched that episode, Allison?

1:17:45Alison Willmore:No, I don't think so. I've watched a lot of Poker Face, but I kind of like all over the place.

1:17:48Griffin Newman:He plays a stop-motion animator whose career is over. that it's a very obvious homage to Phil Tippett.

1:17:56David Sims:Consciously, and I think Brian Johnson's friends with Phil Tippett. But Phil Tippett talks about his own mental health journey and the kind of breakdown he had when CGI replaced stop motion. And it's very much Nolte playing the recovered version of that guy.

1:18:08Griffin Newman:But he's also a murder victim. He's not in it too much. He's heartbreaking. He's great. Yeah, it's a really great performance. But like, yeah, what's like the last... I mean, A Walk in the Woods is I feel like the last time he was like on the poster in a real movie that came out in theater.

1:18:24David Sims:I believe he is like the and in Angel Has Fallen. He is in Angel Has Fallen. Where he's revealed to be Gerard Butler's dad, which totally makes sense.

1:18:33Griffin Newman:I'm your father, Gerard.

1:18:35David Sims:You're right. Yes, of course you are.

1:18:37Griffin Newman:And this is so crazy. He plays someone who lives in the woods.

1:18:39David Sims:Oh, weird. Yes, he's definitely... They're like, where did you come from, Angel? And he's like, well, it's a long story. And then it cuts to Nick Nolte being like, I make wood guns.

1:18:50Griffin Newman:I haven't seen that. That's the third one.

1:18:52Alison Willmore:I'm the Secret Service agent for the trade.

1:18:55David Sims:That's the third one. Right. Because the first one, it's the president is taken. The second one is the prime minister is taken. And the third one is he is taken. I think. I don't know.

1:19:08Griffin Newman:Yeah. Well. I believe you. Nick Nolte Ramsey said, I just thought of him for the role. And I asked to meet. He asked to meet me in person. I went to Malibu. and she says, look, his face is mismeric and you can't take your eyes off him. And, you know, so it's like, I don't know. It's not like she had to go hunting for him. I guess he just doesn't work much, but like he makes sense here. Sissy Spacek is great, obviously. Yeah. She's just a great actor. Lawrence, she's in Causeway. So Lawrence had worked with her. Okay. Okay. Right. I forgot about that. Yeah. I also, I confess, I also forgot about that.

1:19:45Griffin Newman:And then Lakeith Stanfield. Yeah.

1:19:48Alison Willmore:barely in a role barely in it

1:19:50Griffin Newman:it strikes me as the kind of thing where he's just kind of he's the kind of savvy arty actor who probably is like I'll definitely work with Linda Ramsey and she says in the interview I'd love to do like something bigger with him

1:20:00Alison Willmore:I wondered like if that if there were more there that just got chopped down to like this kind of weird vestigial storyline

1:20:06David Sims:it's not Terrence Malick levels but I do feel like she's a filmmaker where like you sign up for the movie and you're like there's a version where you're in the whole thing or maybe you have no dialogue. It does feel like even though it's a little distracting because he's famous enough that you keep expecting him to do more, the movie is asking him to do a thing that is so tied to his innate energy and presence that it does feel like it is effective shorthand casting in a way. But you are also like, did they really just get LaKeith Stanfield to show up and kiss her twice in the woods? I think they may.

1:20:46Alison Willmore:And then get for that

1:20:47David Sims:horrified look when he had that encounter in the parking lot where he was like, oh, no. Right. The idea with the Pattinson character, right, that this is where he grew up. His father is in a pretty extreme state of late stage dementia, it seems. And his mother is a very fragile woman. It feels innately forever. And his uncle has died. And you can infer that there was some sort of, well, there's this house. We could move there. We could live for free. The cost of living is so much lower. Or maybe if we want to have kids, isn't that a better place to raise kids?

1:21:19Alison Willmore:I feel like it's right. Also, it's implied she's pregnant already, right? Like, I mean, in that first kind of like montage where they're kind of dancing and cleaning, it cuts to her being pregnant almost immediately. So I presume that part of the emphasis was like, if we're going to have kids, let's go. We can have a whole house. Yes.

1:21:35David Sims:Right. It feels like even if she doesn't know she's pregnant when they enter the house, it is a thing that they are trying to make happen. and but yes when he talks about like I could record music here it's like there's a sense of they must have met in some cooler college town they both left wherever they grew up and were like hip young artistically activated kids together who stayed together and now they're at this inflection point where he's presenting to her well my dad's sick this house is free we want to have kids isn't that a better place to raise kids and when he gets back there he kind of resets back to who he was growing up.

1:22:15David Sims:That's her fear, that he's sort of, right, like shedding his... That's where I think there's almost a character here. Cool energy, right, right. That it's like this guy is surrendering his cool energy. You kind of have to read it in, but yeah. Yes, to what degree did he just always kind of want to drive a truck? Right. And that was like a dalliance to be like, I make music and shit. He puts down the IPA and he picks up the Budweiser. Exactly, exactly. Yeah. And, you know, this is what's comfortable to him. He's so like activated. The most excited, I would argue, he is the entire movie is in the opening, pointing out to her in the house.

1:22:46David Sims:That's where I chip my tooth. Like he's like, I've returned to my core self. And can I get over this like performative social jockeying, especially if we're together, because I know this is the person I want to be with. And to her, it's like, well, I don't know like if writing is my core identity. But certainly if someone like this is a writer, people go like, you know, she's like a writer. She's all crazy and she does crazy stuff. But if she stops writing, then they're like, what's your deal? He wants to keep saying, I'm going to do music. But he seems to have no ambition to express himself creatively in any way.

1:23:20Alison Willmore:He just he likes guitars. He's so offended when she's like, I hate guitars. Right, right. It's just like such a great thing to just say to someone out of the blue. That's funny. Yeah, exactly. But who hates guitars?

1:23:34Griffin Newman:but it represents something to her yeah yes yeah like you understand what she's feeling at that

1:23:39Alison Willmore:point and she also just wants to make him mad and she's coming out with that but i think also you know you get that flashback early on of her i think it's like like the nolte scene where i think it's like thanksgiving dinner maybe and it's like all of the women are at the table and all of the men are the men are in the other room and you're like you can sense her being like oh is this my future like this kind of like we're in the kitchen or we're at the table and we're talking about women's stuff and like this like really traditional gender split and these kind of like gender roles like you can watch him becoming more I mean there's a point where the point where I mean she's obviously acting out at the pool party but like he has like a panic attack over that right like that kind of like he is already settling into this more kind of like socially conservative pattern that he grew up in and it doesn't feel like that's the first time he's had

1:24:27David Sims:that reaction. It feels like he constantly lives in fear of, you know, the thing with her is sometimes she has her moods, you know?

1:24:34Alison Willmore:Right, right. And like suddenly she has gone from being like they're both like already kind of like like wild and crazy kids to being like she is the crazy one. Right.

1:24:44David Sims:And here is kind of like, you know, her coming out party to the neighborhood in a kind of way. It's like we fixed her. We're a happy family. And now like meet the other housewives. and I think you're right that like even the scene with Sissy Spacek where she goes to visit her and Sissy Spacek holds her up a shotgun out of fear that someone's breaking into her house is kind of like Sissy being like welcome to the club you're on the other side here's how we swallow pain and that is just fucking terrifying to her the idea that there is now an expectation of normalcy or at least keeping up appearances that it feels like what Sissy Spacek is saying to her is yeah, we all feel insane.

1:25:26David Sims:We're all miserable. All of this is difficult. Here's how you handle it. And that is not a thing she's interested in doing at all. And I think it's so telling the moment when Nick Nolte is struggling to tie his shoes and she goes over to him. I think it's maybe the single best moment in the film. And it's key to my reading of what does work in this film is you're like, this guy's off in the corner, struggling so deeply with such a simple task. And it is that like sadness of the elderly feeling the frustration of their loss of ability to handle a thing like that and not knowing what the right way to relate to them is in that moment, to not be condescending, to be helpful, while also not feeling like you are robbing them of any power or ability.

1:26:14David Sims:And she just starts like communicating with him through like faces, like expressive sort of like, you know, like fucking like Comedia dell 'arte versions of emotions.

1:26:27Griffin Newman:Right. Like hold up the like, are you happy? Are you sad? Like a medical chart. Yes.

1:26:32David Sims:Yes. Yeah. And you just see him find a moment of comfort with her where it's like, fuck, we speak the same language. There are very different things going on in their respective brains, but there is a similar, I can't engage with what's happening over there at that table. And what's happening between us is not verbal. And he has this moment of peace and focus and he helps her or she helps him. And then like, you know, 30 seconds later, he freaks out not knowing where he is and who's alive and who's dead and why they're in his brother's house and what year it is.

1:27:07Griffin Newman:People say she's been alive.

1:27:08Alison Willmore:You know what? This year, right? Yes, Allison. My favorite scene is the one, he's driving her back I think from a hospital maybe or like this is after a little while. She's like thrown herself through the window.

1:27:22David Sims:She do throw herself through window. Right. Her relationship to the woods is very similar to Forky's relationship to trash.

1:27:29Alison Willmore:Yes.

1:27:29David Sims:Where he's just, I gotta get back in there.

1:27:31Griffin Newman:At all costs, be I nude, be it on fire. I must be in the woods. Right.

1:27:37Alison Willmore:But so she's thrown herself through the window. He's taken her to the emergency room. They're back. She's like, her face is like covered in scab still and she's like, when's the last time we had sex? Do you know? I really like this. Yes. And kind of demands that he say that he desires her and then starts being like, are we going to have sex tonight? Are we going to have sex when we get home? What if we have sex in the car? Like, right. And it's just, it's so, I think there is this way in which she kind of like revels. She's still obviously Jennifer Lawrence and like one of the most beautiful people on the planet, but like revels in like these moments of kind of like grotesquerie almost.

1:28:11Alison Willmore:In the same way she makes those faces.

1:28:12Griffin Newman:She's being like a little rabid squirrel. Exactly. Which she's good at.

1:28:15Alison Willmore:And it's like, it's really funny and he's so uncomfortable and he's so trying to be like, no, I'm into it. Like, I love this. Like, yes, like, let's have sex in the car with my mom in the house right there watching our baby. Like, it's so good. I think like those scenes are where I really enjoy that performance. Right.

1:28:35Griffin Newman:The thing I liked, there's lots of things I liked. Like, I do buy that she's like, why won't you fuck me? And he's like, no, no, I will, I will. but he probably doesn't want to partly because she'd do be throwing herself through windows all the time I suppose but like partly because of normal postpartum kind of thing and he's clearly

1:28:51Alison Willmore:very stressed and even though

1:28:54Griffin Newman:he's looking at other women you know right that'll turn your house into a Polanski movie eventually right like

1:29:01David Sims:everyone will be crawling up the walls he's looking at other women but it doesn't feel like this movie is doing a thing that I think a worse film would which is sort of implying that it's like well now that she's had a baby. She's not quite the same anymore. And I just, I'm not really attracted to her anymore. It is like everything else going on with her is overriding his animalistic instincts towards her. Which seen by the naked dancing at the beginning of the movie clearly used to be their language.

1:29:28Griffin Newman:Right. Or that's how she feels about their old relationship. Right. Like even if you want to just be in her mind's eye. It's like, yes, we used to have this. Right.

1:29:36David Sims:And when she's like, why won't you fuck me? Used to fuck me in the car. She gets really like graphic in the description of like the process of physical maneuvering to have sex in the car. And he's just like, I don't know what. First of all, if you're intellectualizing it in this way, we're past the point of spontaneity, which is what you really want. And also, our life has too many responsibilities to be that spontaneous in that way is what he like does not say to her. But it is why he's like, I know I do. I guess I do want to fuck you, but not right now. And then isn't it the mom's right there too?

1:30:13David Sims:Yeah, she's babysitting.

1:30:14Alison Willmore:So yeah, yeah.

1:30:15David Sims:And in my memory also, that scene is pretty shortly after the dog.

1:30:20Alison Willmore:Yeah, I mean, I think it's like, she throws herself through the window. And then like, I think there's like a few more scenes after that. And then, yeah, this is. Right. So yeah.

1:30:31David Sims:Because there's like a feeling of when they have these confrontations, it being like, the to-do list of things we need to talk through is now like six items long. We still haven't really wrestled with the dog thing. You know, to some degree, the scene where he's like driving her, I think he's driving her after she's killed the dog, and he's just looking at her like, do I know this person? But he's also trying to like combat his fear and disdain with like, should I be worried about her? Like, what does this say about what's going on and what do I need to do to get through to her? That is the sort of like mad love story part of it, of I cannot fully divorce my emotions from this poor person who I now can't really understand.

1:31:23Griffin Newman:Yeah, she's transformed in some way. She is, again, I keep thinking of no hard feelings. And mother, I guess. I'm trying to think of like her most feral other performances. And there's like roots of it in the David O. Russell movies where she's, you know, quote unquote, she's sort of being crazy in like this 70s throwback way that feels fake and stupid to me.

1:31:46Alison Willmore:I mean, you know what movie this one made me think about is melancholia, you know, like very much. Like the wedding scene also is very much like it starts off and it just, it feels like it encompasses a whole year's worth of drama and also just falls apart so spectacularly. but also like the depiction of depression, you know?

1:32:09Griffin Newman:Well, I think melancholia is a very powerful depiction of depression, right? And like, I am kind of here and there on Lars von Trier. And that's a movie that I saw at the time and liked a lot, but wasn't even like, some people were like, best movie of the decade. Yeah, I love that movie. Yeah, right. But then it quickly kind of like stuck with me. Yeah. Where I was like, I think I might've also just been feeling really bad after I saw that movie because it's about feeling bad and it worked. Like it did a good job conveying the feeling of feeling bad. Yes. Whereas this doesn't to me. This more rattles me, this movie.

1:32:49Griffin Newman:And like that's fun. Like it gets a rise out of me in that way. But it didn't really, I didn't feel in her head maybe in the same kind of profound way.

1:32:58Alison Willmore:That's a Lynn Ransey thing also, I think.

1:33:00David Sims:And you were saying this movie is so much from her perspective. I think this is like weirdly the least protagonist perspective centered film in her oeuvre, which her work is so intimate inside the head that that still makes it feel more sort of singular through this one character's eyes than most movies. But I think it is a little zoomed out. She's not doing, you know, the main device of the book is how much of this is real, more repulsion style. where is the line kind of stuff. Sure, right, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think part of that is that, and partially some of this is the framing and probably why like Ramsey is pushing back on the postpartum thing.

1:33:46David Sims:Not to say that isn't part of the soup, but just like to frame it that way makes a depression movie and does this movie work as a depression movie versus I feel like when we get to the scene where she is committed to the hospital and she's in the sort of like group therapy environment. And for the first time, we get like backstory from her. And it is in a worse film and a worse piece of material, the scene where it's like, oh, and now she breaks down crying and here's the core trauma.

1:34:12Griffin Newman:She's smoking a cigarette and she tells you, right, that her mommy never loved her or whatever.

1:34:16Alison Willmore:And then it's solved and then she can move forward.

1:34:19David Sims:Right. And instead, she like kind of very bluntly, offhandedly explains to this therapist. I said group therapist, but it's a one-on-one scene, right? I can't remember now. she says to this guy, like, yeah, my parents, and here was the dynamic, and my parents were unhealthy, and it was, you know, an emotionally unstable household, and both of them died in a plane crash. And she's sort of presenting it as like, but that, like, doesn't have anything to do with me. And there's a sense of, like, there is something that has been unacknowledged in horror family for a while. You know, there is something that has just been treated with a kind of, like, white-knuckle-get-through-it attitude.

1:35:00David Sims:perhaps, and that then can be manifested and like owned as being a spark plug and being like wild and being creative and all these sorts of things.

1:35:09Alison Willmore:I think also, I mean, I think there are multiple possible elements, right? Like her childhood and, you know, her attachment issues and postpartum and other depression, you know, but like she rejects all of them, right? Like she does not latch on to any of them. And I feel like part of like, I think the power of this movie comes for me from her just being like, it doesn't actually matter which of these things it is because I cannot get a hold of it. And I think like a lot of the great parts of her performance are the ones where she's just conveying someone who is like, like almost just like impossibly restless and unhappy in her own skin.

1:35:45Alison Willmore:you know like when she does she does this thing where she like kind of like drops over from the waist like her like like you know her strings have been cut like she's a you know a puppet whose strings have been cut and then or she makes those weird faces when she's in the car like she you know looks at her own body yeah the lower jaw thing she looks at her body in the mirror in ways that are almost like clinical you know like i think there is this really i think she she does a lot to convey this idea of someone where you're just like what if you can barely stand to inhabit not even in disgust, but just like you are, you barely can stand and inhabit your own body.

1:36:16Alison Willmore:Right.

1:36:17David Sims:And everyone is constantly trying to point to things that are circumstantial. Well, it's tough moving. This is a big culture shock for you.

1:36:24Alison Willmore:And you're like, those are things possibly all contributed, but they are not helpful for her. Right. As like solutions.

1:36:30David Sims:There's a talking around the thing that feels not just about everyone around her, but also about her and her parents. And who knows how far back this goes, You know, if it is like kind of acquired trauma from behavior or if it's a chemical or what. But yes, there's sort of like to a certain degree, like postpartum is the red herring of this movie. And I feel like the Woods thing is her just naturally being drawn to the idea of going back to some natural state. Right. It is literally like, can I be a naked animal in the woods? Can I be night bitch? I just want to fucking stop pretending. I want to stop being told there is a way to behave.

1:37:18David Sims:I want to like get on all fours and eat leaves. Like, what is all of this? You know, like the idea of the pool party is just like just feels like fucking theater to her that she cannot maintain for more than two minutes. and it is so heartbreaking to me because you have this arc of her going in there. You see her settled in the hospital, you know? Her temperament has certainly calmed down, even though she doesn't seem happy. You were like, there is a mania that has lowered. And now it's like, has she, the first time watching this, I was like, is this movie a kind of tragedy of some part of her getting doled off in order to survive?

1:37:56David Sims:And instead, she just rejects it within three minutes. She has to like tell this woman off to her face and rip her clothes off. And what makes sense to her is to like look at the young cashier at the gas station and be like, why the fuck are we talking? Which is another one of the best scenes of the movie.

1:38:13Griffin Newman:Unfortunately, I relate to that scene.

1:38:16Alison Willmore:You hate small talk? Yes, I do. And I, over the pandemic, briefly spent some time in New Hampshire, rural New Hampshire.

1:38:26Griffin Newman:And having grown up in New Jersey, tri-state area, lived in New York, I'm so used to social interactions being brief and curt. And maybe some people would interpret it as rude. I actually really prefer the quick, just, you don't even need to make eye contact with me. It's, yes. And so being out in this rural setting and someone just being like, how about the weather, huh? Like chit-chatting with me. I definitely had these moments where I was so tempted to be like, enough. Just give me the thing, man. Just ring me up.

1:39:10David Sims:Like, I really get it. Well, look, it's a thing that Melancholia gets as well, which is like that movie is all based on this, the idea of Melancholia, the idea of this planet crashing in and possibly pretending an apocalypse being a metaphor, but also being real, which is the power of that movie, which is just like when you are at a deep, deep stage of depression or mania or any other number of things, you are catastrophizing everything, but also you might be right. You know, there is a degree of like broken clock four times a day kind of thing. Like maybe this clock has like multiple correct overlap moments and she's just kind of like seeing things clearly at times, you know, there is, and that also then makes you want to, I think as a person in like a Robert Pattinson position go, well, she was like good yesterday, you know?

1:40:14David Sims:Like yesterday she was normal. We actually had like a conversation. You want to believe that there's an understanding there, but then you see a situation where you're like, what is the point of you asking me questions about my baby? Nothing is accomplished by this. I cannot pretend. Doesn't she make the joke too of like, what's his name? And she's like, I don't know. We haven't really liked it.

1:40:33Alison Willmore:We decided not to name him. Yeah, yeah.

1:40:36Griffin Newman:And yet she has no friends.

1:40:38Alison Willmore:Right? No, she has.

1:40:39David Sims:We learned she has no family.

1:40:40Alison Willmore:Yeah, no one in her life at all.

1:40:42David Sims:Yeah, she's so isolated. You get the sense that I think they were really relationship people. And now it's not like he seems to have a lot of friends on the side. He just wants to like go drive his truck by himself.

1:40:56Alison Willmore:But he also just slips back into his old life like a comfortable shoe. Like it's just.

1:41:02David Sims:What you kind of imagine his father must have been like. Like a kind of stoic man who was like sweet at times, but mostly just wants to go on like long rides.

1:41:11Alison Willmore:Right. And then comes back and is like, why is the house so dirty?

1:41:14David Sims:Right. And that scene where he calls her from the diner and she goes, you're eating lunch or you're eating a cheeseburger. This feeling of like, you can just go and do that. Like you're doing things without me. I'm here listening to fucking Hey Mickey 20 times in a row, which I also think is such a good capturing of a certain kind of like mental anguish of just like, I don't know, I just need to keep fucking listening to this song. He's got the car. He's got the car.

1:41:42Griffin Newman:They have one car. Yeah. And there's something too about seeing her throughout the movie pushing the baby carriage on dirt roads along a highway. It makes me nervous to see it happening.

1:41:56Alison Willmore:And the only place she has to go beyond the gas station store is like her mother-in-law's house. You know, there's really nowhere to go otherwise. She doesn't dislike, but she clearly cannot find a shared language.

1:42:08David Sims:Yeah.

1:42:08Alison Willmore:Though I do love there is an expression in Sissy Spacek's face towards the very end where she does that toast to like, we all die out. That like expression on her face is so wonderful because it is so like, I understand you precisely in this moment.

1:42:20David Sims:And that's why I think the Spacek casting is so good, because you can tell Spacek is a person who always feels so emotionally vulnerable that she cannot be someone who is just putting a brave face on something and not showing you any of how she actually feels. And I think Lawrence is terrified about the idea of being someone like that who isn't numb, but is spending that much active energy suppressing and suppressing for outward appearances, suppressing to not make other people uncomfortable.

1:42:49Alison Willmore:Yeah, I mean, I think one of the best aspects of this film is that it does acknowledge all of the ways in which the women get a raw deal, right? Like from like, yes, being stuck at home with, you know, doing what is not considered work, right? Like, even though like childcare is obviously like requires so much from you and is difficult. and then, and yeah, kind of being expected to just like take care of the house as like part of this like, or, yeah, like the ways that all of the women are like, yeah, isn't it amazing how you just like lose the thread for like six months to a year after having a child?

1:43:22Alison Willmore:Like, like, like that's just part of it. It's really hard. Don't tell me that. Yeah, like all of those things. It, or even like to see SpaceX character having kind of molded her entire life around this kind of coexistence with her husband to the fact that she cannot conceive of a way to even like cook for one person you know like i think there are ways it acknowledges all of those things but also is like i reject that as like the reading of this movie right like like like lawrence's character keeps being like but that's not the answer for me maybe yes it is maybe accurate but also that you cannot solve me that way this is not just about the hardship of being a woman and being a mother this is about me my specifics which are no one can quite grasp right

1:44:02David Sims:Right. And I think it's part of what's amplifying everything innately in her is the biological phenomenon of, you know, being postpartum. And the other part of it is she is almost pushing past and acting out further beyond the more everyone tries to tell her, yeah, we know what this is.

1:44:25Alison Willmore:Yeah.

1:44:25David Sims:Like the more people try to kind of tag her and put a box around it as an experience, the more she's pushing up against it.

1:44:55David Sims:The one that understands you. No matter whether it's a job, job or a job.

1:45:00Alison Willmore:That's right. It's crazy. It doesn't feel like it's paying.

1:45:03David Sims:Paying.

1:45:04Alison Willmore:Safe.

1:45:05David Sims:With Viso Steuer.

1:45:12Griffin Newman:I mean, I guess what I'm alighting on is my problem with this movie, which is, I like the atmosphere of it and I like the performance a lot. but I felt like I had to be doing a lot of the deeper reading into it, kind of. Which is, I mean, which maybe that's fine. And maybe that's kind of the Lynne Ramsey experience because that's sort of true with all of her movies. Right? Like with Lorvern and with You're Never Really Here. I mean, there's stuff. There's little bits of context you get about these characters. She doesn't like to explain. In like piecemeal flashback-y kind of ways. Yeah. And Kevin is all that.

1:45:55Griffin Newman:But they're all a little opaque. They all have that approach. And so, I guess I'm wondering why. Or last year, I was wondering why. A Lin Ramsey movie that was good was kind of like more of a top 25 movie for me than a top 10 one. Right? like you know I wait and like like cause you know like what what was the difference here like what what sort of kept it from I think the highest list of movies I enjoyed in a good movie year

1:46:31David Sims:I think it is the Pattinson character I think I need to shake out my final 10 but it's like does this make it in or not is a question for me and and I think that's the thing it needs to really kind of be uh firing on all cylinders uh like you don't want to tell the movie from his perspective, but you kind of need this character to be able to, his character, to be able to communicate what's going on with him better. Because I think the movie is structured in a way where you're engaged enough to do the work about her. And doing the work to fill in his character feels a little annoying. And I think it is, it's also just what we're saying of like, he's just a little too innately interesting as an actor that if things aren't fully fleshed out, you can't buy it.

1:47:21David Sims:You can't buy blankness from him. You know, there needs to be, like, specificity. He's so odd that you can't just be like, I get it, they cast some boring dude, the dude doesn't matter. You know, I mean, you, like, talking about, like, Night Bitch, like, Scoot McNary is a great actor. He's a good actor! Super, like, electrifying, wiry character actor work. But also, like, casting him as the husband who doesn't quite get that his wife's turning into a dog in Night Bitch is casting, the same as casting him as the dad who doesn't quite understand why the crocodile is singing in La La Crocodile. And is that who he plays?

1:47:57David Sims:That's who he plays. I haven't seen that. There is a shade of him that works as a kind of milquetoast like, I'm sorry, what's going on here? And then he can also do more interesting stuff.

1:48:06Griffin Newman:Was he mad to have not made the above the title billing of La La Crocodile? Do they only offer three? They only have the three. Yeah. He's on the poster going like this. He's gesturing with his thumb at the crocodile. End it, Javier Bardem.

1:48:23David Sims:No, his performance is real. What am I going to do about this? So what, end the voice of Shawn Mendes?

1:48:30Griffin Newman:It's Javier Bardem, Constance Wu, and Shawn Mendes is Lyle. Yeah. Yeah, the kid's not getting it. Oh, is that, which Fegley is it? One of the Fegleys.

1:48:38David Sims:It's the lower, the younger Fegley. It's a Fegley.

1:48:40Griffin Newman:It's a Fegley.

1:48:41David Sims:From tip to toe, that's a Fegley.

1:48:42Griffin Newman:We'll get you a Fegley. That's what they said. How many Fegleys do you want? Two? You want a double Fegley or just one? Can you get the tongs and pull a Fegley out of the soup for me?

1:48:52David Sims:Oh, fuck. We're out of Fegley. Would you be okay with a jupe? Can I give you a jupe?

1:48:57Alison Willmore:Oh, the jupes are kind of high value these days, though. They're stored separately.

1:49:01David Sims:Oh, so you think maybe you get a Fegley if the jupes are sold out? Yeah, I think that's the case.

1:49:05Alison Willmore:Yeah, I think for me, the reason this is a lower tier Lynn Ramsey movie is just because it feels so, yeah, like unmodulated. Like, it does feel like, you know, even that very first scene of her kind of like post the dance, you know, setting up the house montage when they have the baby is like her crawling in the grass with the knife. You know, you're already like you're starting at a place of like splintering. And I feel like it doesn't, I mean, it goes up and down a bit, but it feels like a movie that is like operating at a kind of a scream throughout for me. And I feel like that after a while loses effectiveness.

1:49:41Alison Willmore:this.

1:49:41David Sims:I think that's a strategic decision to try to make it clear that whatever's going on with her didn't start here. Right. That this goes far, far back. But I do. The other movie I was thinking about a lot while watching this movie I did not like was Together.

1:50:00Alison Willmore:Oh, I thought about Together as well. Yeah. I mean, it is about moving out to that part of it where it's like, here's a hip

1:50:06David Sims:artsy couple, and one of them kind of wants to try a more rural life, and the other one feels like they're suffocating. And that is a movie that is like so thuddingly literal with what is happening psychologically, not just the metaphor that then turns into the heightened horror, but also like the character constantly explaining exactly what he's grieving and what he's processing. And that's a movie that does it so fucking much. And also, I think it's a little murky with the supernatural rules to a degree where I'm like, you push me away. You're not letting me do any of the work. You keep going and you get it right in a way that like really turns my brain off.

1:50:46David Sims:And this movie is doing the opposite where I'm like, you maybe need to tell me five to 10 percent more directly.

1:50:53Alison Willmore:Yeah. I mean, there's that point where you're like, am I reading into the film or am I just filling in because I need like I'm coming up with my own material here?

1:51:01David Sims:Yeah. And yes, yes. Yes. And the rubber meets the road with him, you know? And I think the scene of her with the therapist and explaining basically her parents not wanting her. I mean, this feeling that they did not know how to deal with her. They'd been handed something they weren't really prepared for.

1:51:21Griffin Newman:Right.

1:51:22David Sims:And it's still elusive enough where it's interesting to sort of try to parse. Was that her from birth existing in a natural state that was more that they could handle? Speaking to the extremity of the child, or is that a reflection on them and a path that she is continuing? She obviously is trying to exist in opposition to her parents because she is, despite sometimes dancing naked with a knife around a baby, I think very invested in the idea of being present in this baby's life. And yet she cannot fucking figure out how to do this. You know, I think part of her seemingly intentionally getting pregnant before they are even married and making this big commitment is she does like the idea of like, what if I could be the opposite parent?

1:52:04David Sims:That is me filling in a lot, right? But she's also sitting there going like, yeah, but that's not anything. And they're like, and what happened to her parents? Died in a plane crash. As if like, right, that's like a normal thing. I have no problem with the fact that both of my parents died in a plane crash after having a terrible relationship to them. That's just one of those things that happened. Here's my question. Please. Did you assume she was telling the truth there? I did, but I do think it's an interesting question.

1:52:29Alison Willmore:Yeah, because there are other times, I mean, when she says, like, we decided not to give the baby a name. There are other times where she kind of like just to, or I hate guitars. You know, she's like testing people. And there was this moment when she says it where I'm like, it's possible her parents are still around and she just hates them. It's totally possible.

1:52:43David Sims:This character is the Joker. She could be telling you five different stories of like how she got her scars. But in that moment, I believe it because she is not being antagonistic with him. She is trying really hard to take any weight off of what she's saying. And she also has gone into that environment seemingly going like, I get it. I need to fucking work on this. This is like hit a breaking point after the wedding in particular, you know, which is also so interesting as a contrast to Melancholia where like that whole movie is basically built out of the wedding. And you put your character in a big white dress,

1:53:21Griffin Newman:you know, it's gonna set a mood.

1:53:23David Sims:And you have this core kind of like betrayal moment in the wedding of Melancholia where you're like, well, that's a point of no return. Like that's gonna fucking break everything.

1:53:31Griffin Newman:Who's she marrying in that one? She's marrying Alexander Skarsgård. Or is it Skarsgård? She's marrying Alexander Skarsgård. Kiefer's the dad? I remember Kiefer being really weird in that movie. Yeah. Am I wrong in thinking that Kiefer's her boss and that Stellan Skarsgård is his dad?

1:53:49David Sims:Or did they cast Stellan and Alexander not as father and son?

1:53:53Griffin Newman:Alexander is indeed, you know, the husband. Stellan is the boss. So then Kiefer's the dad? And Kiefer is John Clare's husband. And so, yeah. Yeah, right. He's the dad because Clare is Charlotte Gainsbourg. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. who is oh no no right it's isn't Skarsgård

1:54:14David Sims:the boss and the dad

1:54:14Griffin Newman:no no it's a yeah maybe but Claire Claire is her sister right so Kiefer's her brother-in-law right Kiefer's married to Charlotte yes right I have two questions one did you know that Angelina Jolie made a movie in 2024 called Without Blood no no what is this movie war drama it was at TIFF I'm hearing this for the first time. I'm holding one finger behind my ear. I was just thinking of like Seamus.

1:54:42Alison Willmore:No, she directed it.

1:54:43Griffin Newman:She directed it. Oh.

1:54:44Alison Willmore:I'm looking at Seamus McGarvey's

1:54:45Griffin Newman:recent credit. He shot this movie.

1:54:47Alison Willmore:This does sound familiar to me actually.

1:54:49Griffin Newman:It is. And he's obviously a very good cinematographer. He literally. He's got some wacky ass credits.

1:54:55David Sims:Yes. He also, this movie felt like an opportunity for him to do some wacky ass shit where he was like, hey Ramsey, here's some stuff I've always wanted to try. What if you literally set lenses on fire? Yeah. did that, Ben. They were like, let's experiment with burning lenses and camera gates.

1:55:14Griffin Newman:They shot it in Academy, which is a classic thing to do, I think, when you're dealing with inside doors, trees, things that are vertical.

1:55:23David Sims:It's also so funny that that was just the standard kind of prestige ratio for so long and any type of movie could fit in it. And now if a director's employing it, it's like psychological claustrophobia. We're just talking what movies look like. We're trapped in the frame.

1:55:38Griffin Newman:Sort of a square frame versus a wide frame. May I make a comment based on that information? That's cool. It's a hot shot.

1:55:46David Sims:It's a hot shot. These are some hot shots. And then I just walk off. I want to make clear, Ben. The camera was not on fire while they were filming. They weren't like lights. Oh, damn. Camera, match, action. But the sort of like inky quality to it. He was trying to see what would happen if they caused that kind of intentional damage.

1:56:04Griffin Newman:They shot on reversal stock, which I think is a huge pain in the ass to use because you can't control light very well with it. And so the night scenes, they didn't. But otherwise, McGarvey wanted to fuck around. He wanted a non-naturalistic thing. Indeed, he was burning lenses, which created an inky look that he thought was cool. He shot Kevin, but I guess not You Were Never Really Here. Yeah. Which was shot by Thomas Townend. That's what I know. I had another thing to say. Oh, is Joker played by Joaquin Phoenix? Arthur Fleck. The fourth or fifth best Joker in films? Like, it's like, he's not even top three, I don't think.

1:56:52Griffin Newman:Well, so what? We're saying Ledger's number one. Ledger and Nicholson are at the top.

1:56:56Alison Willmore:You know, I haven't seen the Nicholson one for so long. I really need to revisit. It's pretty good.

1:57:00Griffin Newman:I mean, I guess you can put Phoenix in three. No, but I... I feel like you would easily just put, like, Mark Hamill cartoon Joker. I was going to say, Mask of Phantasm was released in theaters.

1:57:07David Sims:Hamill is a lock for third. Right. Many people would argue he should be higher than third. But there's no way that he's above, that he's below Phoenix, a man who won the second man only in history. That's why people don't realize only two men have ever won an Oscar for playing the Joker. More people should do it. Isn't that crazy? There's only ever been two. So, okay, so what happens in Dunbaro? Can I go back to the wedding for a second?

1:57:33Griffin Newman:Yeah, no, that's, I mean, that is a vital, that's like the big, right, you know, thing in the movie,

1:57:38David Sims:the big sequence. It's sort of like the big final battle of like, can we construct a set piece to make her happy, right? Like, if we have this wedding and we presumably invite all our friends from our past lives... Right, and then you'll fuck me, right? Right. It'll be our wedding night. We're literally putting pageantry around this and we're kind of like owning the country Western thing in a hipster way rather than the full immersion that you have been struggling with. And it was where I kind of, the first time watching it, started to be able to fill in some of the blanks on their backstory of just seeing the guests at the wedding and being like, oh, these are their friends from their past life.

1:58:14David Sims:There is whatever percentage of like family, but here are all the friends they have not been seeing who are down with their weird shit, who are into like, yeah, they do weird fucking dancing and look at their outfits and whatever. And then she just takes it too far. She gets too loose. It stops being funny.

1:58:32Griffin Newman:It's not funny. She's going kiss me, kiss me. And you're like, oh my God.

1:58:36David Sims:She kisses Sissy Spacek. And also, it's like the baby is there. Like, everyone is like, she's still acting like this with the baby? I know she's had some drinks, but like, we thought she'd kind of chill out when she was a mother. And then you feel like there's going to be a melancholia thing of like, oh, she's going to vindictively fuck someone else. Spoilers for melancholia. Because her husband isn't fucking her in her wedding night. It seems like it's going to be the guy at the front desk guy. Right. Who she invites up and then just listens to him play acoustic guitar. And you're like, this woman just like does not know what she needs.

1:59:11Alison Willmore:But also, he lets her go up to the room by herself and just is like, I'm going to apparently stay here at my wedding without you and just like make nice with my family.

1:59:21David Sims:I was going to say, it feels like he's strategically like, I can't deal with whatever the fuck's going on up there. Let her do whatever the fuck she wants to do. I need to do damage control for all of our friends and family who I now embarrass myself in front of. And that's his priority, is like the reputation over the relationship. Or even just like really kind of seeing her as a person. That's what I have to say about that.

1:59:46Alison Willmore:What do we think about the John Prine song? It was all over the place, I feel like. Yes. Love that song. I do love that song. I love John Prine.

1:59:53David Sims:The whole soundtrack's really, really good in this.

1:59:55Alison Willmore:Yeah.

1:59:56Griffin Newman:Yeah, I was looking at a GQ article Lynn did an interview talking about her process with picking music for her movies. She always has great soundtracks. So the Cream Crossroads drop was actually suggested to her by Marty Scorsese. I mean, it makes sense that Marty might think of Eric Hudson. He always wanted to use. Yeah, for sure. The punk song in the beginning is her singing. As well as the cover of Love Will Tell Her. So Tear Us Apart is also her. Is Jennifer Lawrence singing? No, it's Lynn. Really? Correct. That's wild. Isn't that cool? And I thought the Joy Division cover was excellent. It's excellent.

2:00:41Griffin Newman:Yeah.

2:00:41David Sims:It's really good.

2:00:41Griffin Newman:Yeah. That is super fucking cool. Yeah. Johnny Greenwood didn't do the music though. But no, sorry, carry on. The reprise at the end of the John Prine song. And who's the other performer? We should say. was not planned. It was just something that she spontaneously decided to do on the day of shooting. Which I think is really such a lovely scene. And almost like a little moment of being able to take a breath and then unfortunately you have the ending. Yeah. I kind of like the ending. I love the ending because it's just sort of like... It's the ending this movie has. It cannot be she comes out of the hospital.

2:01:23Griffin Newman:No. and he's like look I fixed up the house and I'm being better and she's like oh you know what that's what I need I was so worried it was gonna be that this is so bad of me there was a part of me like can she just wake up and it was all a fucking dream Jesus I just like that she's like no enough I fully do not want to do this

2:01:46Alison Willmore:like we've seen the forest on fire in the beginning you gotta come back to the forest on fire at the end

2:01:50David Sims:right and the final exchange with Nick Nolte of just like, you're kind of like returning to the earth, you know? Like you've lost your ability to engage with the idea of society and like polite manners and social interactions and all these sorts of things. I don't read it as, and look, obviously there are many things we read bizarrely in the Rat Catcher episode, a thing that I have thought about since that episode came out. And I do think, Sims, there is something weird to the fact that you and I both saw that movie really young and I think kind of locked into our young reads of the movie not being able to pick up on some of the more complicated things.

2:02:32Griffin Newman:But that was no good that I was not speaking of that. No, absolutely.

2:02:38David Sims:But I was genuinely watching that movie from a weirdly naive perspective that I just, in trying to rationalize it, I think has to come from like, well, when I was like 12, my sense of context clues was much lower than what literally is being depicted

2:02:55Griffin Newman:on screen. You completely missed that like in our description of it in the episode. Yes. Specifically just so you have context. They're assaulting the character. There's these boys who are sexually assaulting this female character and we I just think missed the mark and sort of defining the dynamics. Like what, you know, we were kind of like they are being bad or they are misbehaving. I think I said

2:03:19David Sims:sexually charged bullying

2:03:20Griffin Newman:which I understand

2:03:23David Sims:read as me minimizing a thing rather than me having a bad brain and not interpreting a thing correctly. But I don't, now I apologize for my last incorrect reading, but I think I'm right about this. Yes. No, no, what? The movie's about trauma. No, I think... Oh my God, like Toxie? Yeah, it's about Toxie. It's about Toxie and Sergeant Kabuki Man, NYPD. That's why she's going into the woods because they're all hanging out there. Paltry Geist. I don't read the ending as a suicidal thing. No. She's just done with it. Exactly. It's not her thing. It is metaphorical, but it's like metaphorically, it's metaphorically behavioral, if that makes sense.

2:04:08David Sims:It is sort of like a worldview thing of like, I'm done playing the game.

2:04:14Alison Willmore:Well, also like, you get her walking into the flames and then you get like the shot of the house with like the cake, right? Like, doesn't it kind of, kind of like there's like...

2:04:24David Sims:I think it says, welcome home mommy or we love you mommy. Yeah, or something like that.

2:04:27Alison Willmore:I feel like there is a, you could read the other thing of just her leaving. Like she is like... Yeah, it's like, yeah. Because they're trying to be like,

2:04:34Griffin Newman:are you now ready to be mommy? Yes. Right.

2:04:37David Sims:And that story she tells to the therapist is about like seemingly kind of being abducted by a woman and feeling a relief at someone else taking her away from her parents who never knew how to deal with her.

2:04:50Alison Willmore:Or just also that like this 10-year-old girl, right? She says she's like a 10-year-old girl who took me, the way like those girls on the beach want to take the baby, right? Or like kind of like, oh, it's so fun to kind of play babysitter slash, you know, fake mom for this second.

2:05:03David Sims:But is there like some acknowledgement even from a 10-year-old who could not intellectualize these things of this kid needs something? Like this kid is not being seen.

2:05:13Alison Willmore:Or I mean, even that, I feel like there is something there also. like we don't know of her parents yet like the parents were the ones who are like kind of like the mess here or it's her memory of it but like that she's just like seeing them as adults already not just her parents and being like you're so embarrassed like you're handling this so poorly

2:05:31David Sims:and I wish I didn't belong to you that there is some feeling of her being like you're gonna keep trying to drag me back to raise this child and I don't know if I will ever be helpful to this child. I also think, like, in a movie where you're questioning how much of what you're seeing is real and it's so perspective-based to a degree, all this fire is, like, super CGI and artificial. As we said, like, they're shooting day for night. Like, all of that stuff looks...

2:06:04Alison Willmore:And also, it springs up all over the place simultaneously, right? Like, it's not like she... Because she burns the diary, it starts a fire. No, it is... The whole force immediately comes up in flames. Right, yeah.

2:06:15David Sims:Right. it's a little it is purposefully unreal and it's you know speaking to an ecstatic truth yep the dialogue scene was cut

2:06:25Griffin Newman:I'm just checking the dialogue scene was cut no the thing you mentioned the five page monologue they're like no thank you you know Lynn Ramsey would do things like crawl around for a while please and in this movie they would Johnny Greenwood she who scored her last two movies was into it, was in Italy, was busy. He nearly came back. She obviously had the soundtracks, you know, the needle drops and stuff. She ends up not working with him. I don't know. It feels like it all sounds a little shambolic to me. George Vesfecta? Yes, who's like a Nick Cave collaborator. He's the guitarist from The Bad Seeds.

2:07:07David Sims:Yeah, but there's three music credits on this, including Ramsey, but he seems to have handled the line trail of the score, which I think is very good. Could not find the score from this movie anywhere. I don't know if it's been released in any form, but especially the final underscoring of the woods is really good. But yes, no, it does weirdly feel like probably just because of the engine of Jennifer Lawrence and especially once she got Robert Pattinson on board, this movie kind of came together very quickly.

2:07:38Griffin Newman:Yeah, and obviously that's part of what we should talk about another thing is she plays music um on set camera crow thing peter weir does that you know people do that uh just to end people up of course is he very protective of her uh throughout we love you marty the film goes to can i don't know what the i don't know if there is a listed budget i don't i can't imagine this cost a ton of money to me no it's not many

2:08:09Alison Willmore:locations.

2:08:09Griffin Newman:Right. Did you see it at Cannes? I saw it at Cannes. Did it change? Because I heard that it was like not done.

2:08:17Alison Willmore:I think it did. Rewatching it, I feel like... Probably not drastically. Yeah, I felt like there were, especially in the opening sequences, it felt like it had been tightened up, but then, I don't know, you know, but like, yeah, it felt like it was like just barely done. She traditionally goes to Cannes

2:08:33David Sims:and is like, by the way,

2:08:33Griffin Newman:the movie's not finished. Right, I'm still working. I mean, it was a, it felt like, it was sort of a weird can, but it was a not a it was a fairly strong one. Yeah, I feel like there were a lot of great

2:08:44Alison Willmore:films. I think, you know, it was interesting. Yeah. It was ignored. The secret agent.

2:08:50Griffin Newman:Awards wise.

2:08:50David Sims:Yeah. And it like it landed positively. But then the movie deals happens and everyone's kind of like are they seeing something

2:08:58Griffin Newman:we're not getting here? Well, I think what they, I mean, I from afar had not seen this movie. I was like, well, it has movie stars in it. Like I imagine they think they can sell it based on that. And they did do a good job with the substance. And what's it about? It's about Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson like getting naked and being crazy? Yeah. That sounds like something you could sell. Sure. Right? I don't know. I mean,

2:09:19Alison Willmore:there was a lot of skepticism at Cannes about that number. Like, what are they thinking? Yes.

2:09:24Griffin Newman:They bought it for a lot of money.

2:09:26Alison Willmore:Yeah.

2:09:27David Sims:I also, you know,

2:09:28Griffin Newman:I feel like I've talked to

2:09:31David Sims:Righteous John,

2:09:32Griffin Newman:it last October. Yeah. And it was at Cannes in May. So like, it was all pretty fast.

2:09:36David Sims:Right. Like, yeah. Um, The problem is when you hear something like Mubi bought the Lynn Ramsey movie for$20 million, a filmmaker who has never had a movie really exceed$10 million globally. Right. Even with two A-list stars. No, like all of her movies, in fact, have made about$10 million. And like a million or two domestically. You sort of go like, what is the calculation they're doing here? And for people like us who are like very deep in the weeds on the movie industry, but also are not working in fucking distribution or whatever, you used to be able to read like Fox Searchlight has bought X movie for$12.5 million and go like, OK, back of napkin math.

2:10:18David Sims:They're hoping they can put whatever amount into marketing and get it to this amount domestically and assume that they can then sell the foreign rights to other people or DVDs or whatever it is. You hear like Mubi has bought a thing for$20 million. It's the same as like Apple buying Coda for Sundance out of Sundance for 25, which I still think is the record. And going like, well, that sounds like it doesn't make sense at all. But also, they have obscured what the business model even is anymore.

2:10:48Alison Willmore:It's the like equals question mark profit, right? Like aspect, the streaming aspect where you're like, okay, I guess someone could argue that maybe Jennifer Lawrence's face on Mubi.com, you know, like. That might be true. Yeah. I mean, I just don't know how to quantify it, right? It's impossible to quantify.

2:11:06Griffin Newman:Her next movie, that she's more likely to work with them. What is the last movie Jennifer Lawrence made to have made$100 million at the domestic box office? Did Passengers cross$100? The answer is Passengers. It came out 10 years ago. 101 did$100 even domestic. Now, Dark Phoenix made$246 worldwide, but that was an unambiguous bomb. And made like$65 domestic. Very poor. And...

2:11:30Alison Willmore:Don't Look Up does not have box office. It sure does not.

2:11:32Griffin Newman:Now, I think Don't Look Up did well. But was the most watched movie. Right, like on for Netflix. But like, you know, outside of her two franchises, which always did well, her last passenger sort of scraped by. Yeah. But her last real fucking hit is American Hustle. Yeah. Which was like a no kidding hit. Yes. Crazy to consider. But she's also part of that. She's part of it. And like before then, I guess it's Silver Linings. Yeah. She's got, and this is where I guess why I was thinking about Angelina, where I'm like, we all agree she's a movie star. She's someone people care about. She's still famous.

2:12:06Griffin Newman:She's taken kind of a break and hasn't made people disinterested in her. She's a little... She's not the cool young thing anymore, but she's still a thing. But you are kind of like... You know, if... At the end of the day, I wouldn't buy her movie thinking, oh, Jennifer Lawrence will get me 40 mil, 60 mil.

2:12:26David Sims:The big thing, because you know, the two franchises are the two franchises. And I would argue she added a tremendous amount to both of them, but you also can't give her full credit for those numbers. I would argue the thing that made her stats look so insane to everyone was Silver Linings and American Hustle. Yeah. That it's like even... He's grown up essentially movies. Even 10, 15 years ago, the idea of oh my god, it's like a fucking dramedy that is R-rated that is crossing$100 million even if she's not the only person there, she in both cases kind of came out of the movie with the most energy, was the sticky thing.

2:13:05David Sims:And they were like, well, if she can do that, then she can fucking do anything. And then, as you said, like, she pushes the limits and makes, like, a couple movies that are more off-putting. And immediately audiences are like, yeah, we're not going to go there with you. We'll go there selectively when you're doing something we're already interested in.

2:13:23Griffin Newman:But I don't know what the strategy for this movie should have been. I guess not by 2020.

2:13:27Alison Willmore:I mean, I don't think there was one. I really do think they were just like, maybe we can pull a substance even though I'm sure everyone at the team at the time knew this was not going to be a substance level movie. Like, it's just, the substance is like, I mean, I like the substance a lot. Sure. But it's like, a kind of like campy, outrageous body horror dark comedy, you know?

2:13:46David Sims:And it's a lightning in a bottle thing. Yes, yes.

2:13:49Alison Willmore:And it had the kind of, yeah, I think, I'm sure they thought they could make the kind of meta-narrative of like Lawrence as a mother and Lawrence coming out as this serious actor again after this time off. But that's a less kind of like... That's so different than you've never taken Demi more seriously before.

2:14:06Griffin Newman:Right. And the substance is, quote unquote, demanding in that it's very violent or whatever. But this is a demanding watch. It's not something you tell your friends to go see automatically.

2:14:19David Sims:No, and substance was demanding in a way that felt like a challenge that people wanted to take. can you fucking handle the substance?

2:14:27Alison Willmore:People were like fainting in, you know, like screenings and things like that. Like that's like a kind of dare as opposed to this, which is to be like, can you handle this movie because it's like grueling? Yeah.

2:14:38David Sims:It's her longest movie ever. You look at the substance which like opened well, but then really fucking held in there, right? And was seen as like, is this going to be on like the outside of maybe a Best Actress nomination? And then you're like, it gets fucking picture and director. She almost wins actress, like all this stuff. and what kept that movie alive did really kind of feel like it was the fucking memes, not to be reductive, but it was just like, huh, this movie has like crystallized five things that now you can just use the image as shorthand. And I did think that created some FOMO of people who weren't in it being like, I got to see what this fucking thing is with Demi Moore in the mirror.

2:15:17David Sims:No, I think so. Because everyone keeps saying this got us. It had a legitimate

2:15:21Alison Willmore:cultural footprint.

2:15:23David Sims:And so if you're watching this movie at Canon, you're like, fuck, Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson are doing weird, nonverbal things. Is this thing going to produce 80 ,000 memes? But that's not really understanding the relationship to memes that feed into the value of the actual project versus the things that become decentralized and completely removed. You can't fake this. It happens or it doesn't happen.

2:15:47Griffin Newman:Right, totally. How many Golden Globes has Jennifer Lawrence been nominated for? Really good question. Okay, so. Including this film, of course. Yes.

2:15:55David Sims:Winter's Bomb. Did they nominate all the actual Oscars, American Hustle, Silver Linings, Joy? Of course they did. Okay. And Die My Love is five. And they nominated her for Don't Look Up. They sure did. That's six. And I'm trying to think anything else they would try. They didn't do any of the Hunger Games. No.

2:16:17David Sims:Is there another one in there? There is. There's one more. Comedy. It's a comedy. Oh, did they nominate it for No Hard Feeling? They sure did. That's kind of cool of them.

2:16:24Griffin Newman:She's a seven-time nominee. How many wins? She won for American Hustle.

2:16:32David Sims:She won for American Hustle, right? She has won three threes. Okay, so she won for American Hustle. She won for Silver Linings. Yes, of course.

2:16:40Griffin Newman:She won the Oscar, of course.

2:16:41David Sims:Yes, and she won for... They didn't give it to her for Winter's Bone. No. Did they give it to her for Joy? They gave it to her for Joy. See, that's a real Jennifer Lawrence. You got to go away for a moment. I really think so.

2:16:52Griffin Newman:I sort of vaguely remember her being like, um, I'm sorry. Guys, come on, please. It's Best Actress in a Comedy, but she beat Amy Schumer in Trainwreck and Melissa McCarthy in Spy, which are like, you know, genuine actress in a comedy movies. Yeah. And then like Maggie Smith, Lady in the Van, Lily Tomlin, Grandma, like, sure, you know, we can...

2:17:12David Sims:But that's a year kind of designed to make Judd Apatow mad. Yeah. It is a little bit. It is. Pretty much. It is. We were, Allison and I were just... The Joy, by the way, is not a comedy. No, it's not.

2:17:23Alison Willmore:No, it's not. No. Like, no.

2:17:26David Sims:Arguably less so than any other David O. Russell movie, including his two war movies.

2:17:30Alison Willmore:Yeah, it has a kind of, I guess, like a sort of antic tone,

2:17:34David Sims:but it has no jokes. It's not funny.

2:17:36Alison Willmore:Yeah.

2:17:36David Sims:But no, we just did a good one, Jesse David Fox's podcast and talked about the Martian year being the year that broke everybody. And we're like, Martian's funnier than a lot of movies that have won Golden Globe comedy. Absolutely.

2:17:49Griffin Newman:I argued that on Critical Darlings.

2:17:51David Sims:But it does feel similar to giving the award to Jennifer Lawrence where everyone was like, you know what? Fucking enough is enough. This is just the year that breaks us. This isn't the most egregious case. Right. But Judd Apatow will never forget.

2:18:04Griffin Newman:Yeah. People were mad about it at the time. Now, what did it be? Let me see.

2:18:08David Sims:We went over this. Well, so Trainwreck was nominated. Yeah. What were the other three, David? Like Best Pictures. Yeah. Musical or Comedy.

2:18:17Griffin Newman:Big Short. Which, like, why didn't they give it to that? because that was a big Oscar contender that is a satire. That is actually a weird move on that part. Like, it has dramatic elements, but, like, you can call that a comedy. Absolutely. And then Joy and Spy. Spy, a great comedy. Very fun. And Joy, not very funny.

2:18:34David Sims:Yeah.

2:18:35Griffin Newman:About a mump.

2:18:35David Sims:Yeah. Can I throw out one other thing? Just because in executive producing Critical Darlings and staying engaged with the feedback and everything, and us coming out of Winterfall where we had to cover some new releases that were more limited releases, I feel like there is always this dialogue I see with our listeners, people who do not live in what are kind of deemed the major movie markets, getting frustrated when they have to listen to podcasts that are talking about films that they feel like I'm six months away from getting to see this. I don't know if this ever comes in my theater. I have to wait until streaming.

2:19:10David Sims:And when you add on to that, the festival circuit and a movie like this where you're like, I'm seeing everyone I follow online talk about it in May. and then everyone who missed out on that basically gets to see it in whatever, September, October. And then I'm waiting all the way here to that. Why can't these things like be more democratic now? And the counter argument, and I'm not saying this in a positive or negative way, but it is just like a reflection of reality, is like the flop ball problem. This happened, I would argue, in 2021 as well, when the studios were still feeling so sheepish about theatrical and there were theaters that reopened.

2:19:48David Sims:There were more screens than they had things to fill them with. And stuff like Tatan was like opening on 900 screens opening weekend. And there was this little moment of hope of like, maybe this just means that like smaller movies get out wider and faster. They have the space for them. And because of the internet, we don't need to platform and this can just get out there. And what happened was that like most, if not all, of those movies belly flopped. And like major financial baths were taken and it was sort of a necessary sacrifice to fill screens with things and the data was accumulated and they walked away.

2:20:22David Sims:And then it happened again this fall, which I think was an end result of the strikes from like two years ago, caused like a lot more gaps in scheduling. We finally got to the business end of that. There are, because of post-production timelines, now finally the few tentpole movies that came on either side were interrupted by the strikes. And so there's a lot of like, guess what? Smashing Machine, 2 ,000 screens opening weekend. Die, my love. And with these bigger stars also, especially... Big star movies, yeah. A lot of times these people write into their contracts, especially if they don't want to go to streaming.

2:20:58David Sims:You buy this movie, you are promising...

2:21:02Alison Willmore:A wide release.

2:21:02David Sims:A wide release. Now, it doesn't promise you have to open wide in a lot of cases. No, because that'd be crazy. But a lot of these distributors just go like, it's so fucked, fuck. If we have to get to 2 ,000 at some point, why just not do it now? And the negative is the thing bombs. And then the headline becomes, why the fuck are these stars making these self-indulgent movies that no one wants to see? This is a failed commercial play. And it creates more conservatism in what gets made.

2:21:29Griffin Newman:If Smashing Machine had been well-reviewed, it would have opened bigger and done fine.

2:21:34Alison Willmore:That's unambiguous. If it had been another movie, basically. That is true.

2:21:39Griffin Newman:But let's say that movie had gotten raves and it's basically the same movie. obviously that wasn't going to happen because people didn't really respond to it that way but like I think the raves and the you must see Dwayne Johnson play this athlete would have gotten enough butts in seats for it to make like so what did it open to like it was the lowest opening he's ever had it opened to like five or six right and like probably could have gotten to like 15 or you know like a more respectable kind of A24 big open totally there was the

2:22:07David Sims:the fucking Taylor Swift album release yeah there was totally sideswiped them they were going to get some default box office from being the only thing.

2:22:15Griffin Newman:Yes, there was that too. Right. But like, you know, it's like that was something where I was like, I think the reviews did it in. Die of My Love felt more complicated. It was like, got good reviews, but the movie's a tough sell. No one knows what it's about. I don't think people knew it came out. The advertising is weird. I'm sorry.

2:22:29Alison Willmore:It's hard to be like... And it's hard to sell this movie. Yeah, that's it. Like, it doesn't sound appealing to a lot of people to be like, this is going to be a look into this woman's like kind of like downward mental spiral. No.

2:22:39David Sims:And like, if a movie like this is going to catch on. It kind of needs to catch on organically. You can't sort of, like, build up ahead of, like, need-to-see hype on it. You need to, like, have this movie find its champions organically and have it dissipate. And it's like, you're releasing movies in a way where there's no ability for there to be, say, like, a letterboxed growth, you know? Of people claiming it early, of seeing logs, of being like, huh, I agree with this person's taste most of the time. Like things that are kind of this, you know, the distributors are trying to understand more of how to get more difficult films to catch on at the box office, which is like there is a younger, more engaged online cinephile audience.

2:23:24David Sims:And how do you get through to them? And you can't just kind of fucking blitzkrieg them.

2:23:29Alison Willmore:Yeah, but I think also, you know, we're looking at like, A24 obviously knows what they're doing, even if I feel like the smashing machine was unusual for them in having an actor like The Rock and kind of being like, how is this going to go? But like, Christy, you know, which got a wide release, a disastrous wide release, that was Black Bear, a new distributor, you know, they've been a production company, they haven't been in distribution very long at all. If the movie doesn't sell at Toronto

2:23:54David Sims:and they're like, fuck it, we're putting it out in six weeks. Yeah. Why?

2:23:58Alison Willmore:Yeah. And so like that just felt like a kind of like really like Hail Mary endeavor that obviously didn't work out for them.

2:24:04David Sims:That was crazy. There's that insane anecdote that like six weeks out or whatever, four weeks out, the movie was like testing to open to like three. And they were like disaster. And Sydney Sweeney goes like, great, I'll fucking amp up the promo mode. She does the most insane press tour anyone's ever done. She didn't do the right press tour. But she does everything. I know she did a press tour. And they're like, oh, my God, the public awareness of this movie has gone from like eight to 98. And then it opened lower than it had been tracking a month earlier. It's a two hour, 15 minute movie about domestic violence.

2:24:36David Sims:Right, that's the thing. And the only thing like Sidney Sweeney succeeded in promoting in that press tour was her cleavage and what's going on here. It wasn't like, huh, I really want to see this performance.

2:24:46Alison Willmore:Yeah, well, I mean, again, it is a movie where you're like, if you give a fair logline description. And I think it's, I think it's, she's great in the movie, but it is like, this is a movie about a boxer that you probably don't know about unless you're deep in boxing. No, not a, yes. And the other half of it is going to be about how her abusive husband attempts to murder her.

2:25:07Griffin Newman:Right. Like, really, it's like terrible. It's like a terrible, scary movie.

2:25:12Alison Willmore:It's this incredibly brutal depiction of a controlling abusive relationship. Which is another thing

2:25:15David Sims:with all these like flop fall, like movie star, kind of prestige project failures is like, you guys want to see a Springsteen biopic? Yeah. It's about the period where he wrote the album we don't talk about that much. And it's mostly him just kind of trying to work through his childhood trauma. Right. You're like, well, that's the least fun version of it. You could sell me. Right. Smashing Machine. What's it about? It's sort of an addiction drama, but it's more about the guy just trying to kind of make peace with himself as the addiction stuff's going on in the background. And David and I have both like contended this whole time.

2:25:48David Sims:I like that movie have both contended like there was not one of those movies where it underperforming or flopping is inexplicable, where you're like, people should have fucking shown up to this. There was just kind of a belief that they could like make Gabbo happen. And I think it's all like a pipeline problem. You know, I think like you put Die My Love in one third as many screens as they put it in opening weekend and it would have made the exact same amount of money but in fuller theaters. Yes. You could probably have put it on one-fifth as many screens. Yeah. And it would have done the same.

2:26:26Alison Willmore:Yeah.

2:26:27Griffin Newman:Well, it came out November 7th, 2025. It opened number eight at the box office. It's a perfect Thanksgiving movie. $2.6 million. Yeah. It ends up at? Five domestic ten worldwide. So it is her classic number. Yeah, it's her highest

2:26:41David Sims:grossing domestically. Sure. but lower international than she usually does.

2:26:46Griffin Newman:They all make 10. She's a 10-er. Except for Ratcatcher, I think literally all her movies have paid$10 million. Number one at the box office is a pretty successful franchise sequel that is new this week. It's not Zootopia. No, no, no. Because you would describe that

2:27:03David Sims:as a fucking juggernaut. That was a very big movie. By the time this episode comes out, Zootopia has probably taken the crown as 2025's highest gross. There's no question. it did the legs on that thing

2:27:14Alison Willmore:and also and they love it in China insane

2:27:17David Sims:I believe they've elected Zootopia to prime minister he's a good he'd be a good prime minister yeah

2:27:23Griffin Newman:um okay

2:27:23Alison Willmore:why don't they kiss though you've got the bunny and the fox they have to kiss

2:27:27Griffin Newman:it just raises a lot of questions I know but I'm just saying

2:27:30Alison Willmore:they put it out there I just think Zootopia is like

2:27:32Griffin Newman:we are not ready to talk about hybrid marriage between species but they're like

2:27:37Alison Willmore:we know you want to talk about that I agree with you I agree with you the whole movie is like you're thinking about it so much It's wiggling its eyebrows.

2:27:42David Sims:It's acting all coquettish. What do you mean? I would never. You're like, you fucking have pages that you're just not showing us. Someone's got pages. You have files. Okay. It's fairly successful.

2:27:56Griffin Newman:Yeah, this is like a solidly successful sequel. A two? No, it's too complicated. It's too complicated. It's too complicated. It's like... Is it like a tendril? Yeah, it's like the latest of these movies. there have been like six or something I don't know plus a couple spin-offs moderately successful it's new this week it's opening to 40 million dollars we all saw it we all thought it was pretty good we all saw it I don't know if Allison saw it

2:28:21Alison Willmore:it's gone from my brain

2:28:23Griffin Newman:what did it end up at this is so recent it's not the magician

2:28:25Alison Willmore:movie is it

2:28:26Griffin Newman:no it's not now you see me no it's it ends up at 184 worldwide it's Predator Badland

2:28:32Alison Willmore:I didn't see it people like that movie though

2:28:34David Sims:yeah it's a good movie yeah it is a funny way to describe that franchise that is 100 % accurate where like how many have there been?

2:28:40Alison Willmore:Five, eight, ten? Yeah. Depends on your perspective. Isn't there like a just the Predator Predator like with a without a

2:28:48David Sims:Yeah, there's both Predators and the Predator. The Predator, yeah.

2:28:51Alison Willmore:Yeah.

2:28:52David Sims:No, it's a good movie. It's a solid fun movie. It's fun, yeah.

2:28:56Alison Willmore:That's the best part of Anaconda the Anaconda movie that they made the new one is when Jack Black is writing the script and he's like the Anaconda.

2:29:03David Sims:I remember asking you Allison, does it have any juice? And you said That's the one joke.

2:29:07Alison Willmore:That's the one joke.

2:29:08Griffin Newman:He writes the word the and I laughed. Number two is a romantic drama that I did not see but heard was fairly unhinged. It's the Colleen Hoover one. And what is it called? Is it called Without You? No.

2:29:21David Sims:Were any of those words right?

2:29:23Griffin Newman:You was correct.

2:29:24David Sims:Is it called Forgetting You? Closer.

2:29:26Griffin Newman:Is it called Forgiving You? No. I did not see that. Is it two words? Yeah. I can picture the poster though. It's something you.

2:29:33David Sims:Regretting You? There you go. Yeah. I listened to the big pick. trying to explain what that movie was about and I could not make sense of it. Directed by Josh Boone.

2:29:43Griffin Newman:It was like someone trying to explain quantum physics. Of, of course, The Faults in Our Stars and The New Mutants. Yes, of course. With the big four, Alison Williams, McKenna Grace, Dave Franco, and Mason Thames.

2:29:56David Sims:McKenna Grace has been working so much that I'm like questioning if there's a Hermione Granger, Time Turner thing going on.

2:30:01Griffin Newman:I also kind of forget who she even is. Yes. But then I'm like, but who's this? like this is her this actress reminds me of someone it's always her anyone who's a

2:30:11David Sims:McKenna Grace type

2:30:12Griffin Newman:in a movie five movies in 2025 she was in

2:30:15David Sims:Five Nights at Freddy's yeah she was in Regretting You yeah she's in the fucking Scream 7 coming out she's in that

2:30:23Griffin Newman:that's true right what else did she have last year it's insane I mean shit that I've never heard of What We Hide yeah Slanted sure of course oh

2:30:31Alison Willmore:Slanted is like Anniversary

2:30:32Griffin Newman:well yes

2:30:34Alison Willmore:oh a kind of horror comedy okay about race. Right.

2:30:38David Sims:And she's now the lead of the next Hunger Games. It's about a

2:30:41Griffin Newman:Chinese-American high schooler who undergoes ethnic modifications. Surgery. Perfect. But yes, she is the new Hunger Games heroine. Yes, she's in the new Hunger Games, which is the Haymitch movie. Sunrise on the Reaping. Right.

2:30:56Alison Willmore:Which Jennifer Lawrence is supposed to reprise her role in.

2:30:59Griffin Newman:Supposedly, I think I imagined in a scene. And the movie that will finally win Glenn Close her Oscar. I said this before, I don't know why they did not try to get Glenn Close an Oscar nomination for Wake Up Deadman. My guy, I rewatched that movie last week. She's very solid in it. She's good. She's good in it. She has a major role. We nominated her for fucking Hillbilly Elegy. It's so insane. You can't just get her a fucking nom.

2:31:22Alison Willmore:It feels like they never thought about that movie in an Oscar context.

2:31:25Griffin Newman:It feels like they completely both other... I really kind of love that movie. Knives down the glass and you both got Oscar nominations. Rian Johnson is not unknown to them. And Glenn Close is a big model. And I'm just like, are you not obsessed with getting her an Oscar? She wouldn't win. There's too strong, you know, like a...

2:31:42David Sims:In the least arrogant way, though, that movie feels like Rian Johnson rolling up his sleeves and going like, guys, I'm going to try to make it easy for you. I understand the Glenn Close Oscar thing keeps butting up against the problems of the movie she's in a repellent dog shit. What if I make a movie that is respectable and I give her all the kinds of scenes you would want?

2:32:03Griffin Newman:Yeah. number three the box office is a film we discussed a lot in a future episode but I don't think either of us have seen it is a horror sequel

2:32:12David Sims:oh it's the black phone 2 black phone 2 yes

2:32:16Alison Willmore:the grabber yes

2:32:17David Sims:it's back you'll hear that in a couple weeks yes

2:32:20Griffin Newman:yes which was a decent hit well Mason Thames of course the McKenna Grace I assume it's Thames right is it not pronounced like the river I thought it was Thames I have no idea who knows no one knows

2:32:32David Sims:no one's ever seen his face but he had three number one movies he did in 2025 and two of them are in this current top five you're reading he is the male lead of both

2:32:42Griffin Newman:of both regretting you or no he's a male lead in regretting you he is the young male lead and how I met your dragon

2:32:50David Sims:how I met your dragon

2:32:53Griffin Newman:number four at the box office is something I've never heard of what the fuck is this it is a oh my god a biological drama film, biographical drama film. Biographical. Is it faith-based? It must be because Zachary Levi is involved, but it's Amazon MGM. Okay.

2:33:12Alison Willmore:Oh, no. This is that one. It's like a survival movie, isn't it? With like boats. Yeah.

2:33:16David Sims:Is it that one? I don't think so.

2:33:18Griffin Newman:I don't see a boat.

2:33:19David Sims:I see a dog. The survival boat one is weirdly directed by Joe Carnahan.

2:33:23Alison Willmore:Yeah. And Josh Duhamel is also, I think.

2:33:26David Sims:That is not this. That is not this? Is this movie called like Inventing Sarah? Sarah. Sarah's Oil. Sarah's Oil. He was trying to hone in on that fucking Lorenzo franchise, see if he could make like an off-brand.

2:33:40Griffin Newman:It's about, it's like a true story. Yeah. I don't really, I don't think I can summarize in time what the fuck this is about.

2:33:50Alison Willmore:Lorenzo's Oil though, great joke in Splitsville. Yes. Incredible joke.

2:33:54David Sims:Because what is it? There are two blank check movies that are major running jokes in Splitsville. And someone just posted on Reddit, you will never guess which two. Well, a lot of Lorenzo's oil. That movie is very funny.

2:34:10Griffin Newman:Number five at the box office is a movie that a lot of people have been trying to beat the drum for as like the dad movie of the year that is good. It is not good. It is not good? You think it's bad? I don't like this movie, as you know. Alex Ross Perry recently called it his second favorite movie of the year to us, somewhat as a joke. Oh, Nuremberg. Film is Nuremberg.

2:34:27David Sims:Yeah, I asked Alex Ross Perry what his top 10 for the year was, and he said, no point in wasting time. I will not dignify 10 movies with any positive endorsement. By the way, Nuremberg, Iron Lock on number two. I missed Nuremberg.

2:34:43Alison Willmore:Wait, what was his number one? I think One Battle. He was like One Battle.

2:34:46David Sims:He actually likes it. Nuremberg, number two. Who can be bothered to rank eight more?

2:34:50Alison Willmore:After that, the movies ended. Cinema was over. So, yeah.

2:34:53Griffin Newman:But Nuremberg, a very solid hit. forgiven that it was, you know, sort of, I mean, maybe that's over the top because it made 14 domestic, but 44 worldwide. I mean,

2:35:03Alison Willmore:that's pretty good. Pretty good. Also,

2:35:05Griffin Newman:especially in, especially for a movie that like was not that well received. And I was going to say in the flop fall,

2:35:09David Sims:you never would have predicted like Nuremberg is going to like multiple like times outgross

2:35:15Griffin Newman:Smashing Machine. Yeah. No, I mean, it did all right. It's long. It's boring. It doesn't really have a grasp on stuff. And I really do think it makes the terrible mistake of having its arc be Rami Malek realizing that Herman Goering is not a good guy. It's just insane. Other people have argued with me on this. Like, no, that's not what it's about. I'm like, it's a little bit what happens, though. I'm sure Russell Crowe is giving an effervescent... He's all right. Feather light touch performance. It's not feather light touch. Russell Crowe is an actor I basically always like. Like, I am rather against a Russell Crowe performance, even if I think he's phoning it in or he's being a little silly or whatever.

2:35:56Griffin Newman:And it's like a good use of him in that you're like, yes, Russell Crowe is someone I would kind of want to like me. Even if he were Herman Goering and I was not his friend. Yeah. Nor did I need to be. Yeah. Like, I mean, so then, yeah. Okay, number six, the box office. Was nominated for a bunch of Oscars, including Best Picture. Number six at the box office was nominated for a bunch of Oscars, including Best Picture. Is it Hamnet? No, it's been out for three weeks. Made 17 domestic, 40 worldwide.

2:36:24David Sims:It's a 17 domestic 40 worldwide movie. What were you about to say about it? It's a... Who's the distributor? Focus. It's a fuck-us movie. Mm-hmm. Fuck-us features.

2:36:37Griffin Newman:You know, it's a director that makes movies. Oh, it's a director that makes movies.

2:36:41David Sims:Okay, so that narrows it down a little.

2:36:42Griffin Newman:He's got an actor who's been making them with him for a while at this point. Okay, so they're a team.

2:36:46David Sims:They've become a bit of a team. They've become a bit of a team, and it got a Best Picture nomination. Yeah, and he got her her third acting nominee. there we go recently discussed

2:36:57Alison Willmore:yeah

2:36:57David Sims:yeah 17 did that hit 20 or no I just said 17 was the total the final end total okay yeah

2:37:06Griffin Newman:but did alright for a movie like that yeah yeah that's the thing yeah that's the thing do you guys like Begonia

2:37:11Alison Willmore:I like it yeah well we just did an episode about it and I like rewatching it I liked it a lot more than I had the first time I watched it oh interesting I was like very down on it the first time I watched it. I was not on

2:37:26David Sims:mic for that, so I didn't weigh in. Of course, Woman was guest on that episode. Yeah. Mayor. But Mayor of Blanktown. I was very frustrated while watching that movie, and then I got to the end, and I was like, huh, I like the ending. And like the ending, not just as like big swing, but like, huh, it's kind of sitting with me well. And then I remember you and I texting about it that following week or two after we'd seen at Sims and both being like,

2:37:53Griffin Newman:I'm liking chewing on it. The themes of it resonate with me. I don't find it like the most pleasant lot. But I have wondered if I watch

2:38:01David Sims:it again, will it grow for me? The first 85 to 90 % of it, I was like, this just isn't for me. I'm just not into this. And then I did like it more with Distance.

2:38:11Griffin Newman:So, I don't know. Number seven at the box office is an anime movie that was a solid hit. I'm sure Ben saw it, or he wanted to at least. okay so does it star dogs and or cats no I mean I don't know who it stars it's an anime movie yeah but dogs or cats is a valid question for an anime but I don't know it doesn't have animals in the picture is it an animated animal movie I don't think so but I don't know anything about it your weirdness is this low it's chainsaw yeah there you go

2:38:38David Sims:he does have a dog who's a chainsaw

2:38:40Alison Willmore:he's not in it a lot

2:38:42David Sims:the dog

2:38:42Alison Willmore:wait the dog turns into a chainsaw well he has

2:38:46Griffin Newman:his head becomes a chainsaw he's kind of like

2:38:48Alison Willmore:It's like the guy can turn into a chainsaw, right? Multiple chainsaws. His head and his arms. He's made of chainsaws. Yeah, if he wants to be. Yeah. I didn't know there was a dog chainsaw.

2:38:55Griffin Newman:I realized it's actually kind of cute. We're out of the top 10. And they have a really nice dynamic. Yeah, we don't need to be guessing. The price is going this long. Die My Love, 9 is Deliver Me From Nowhere, which is not very good, unfortunately. And 10 is Tron Aries, which is also not very good. You know, Fall, Fall, they made some bad movies. Yeah.

2:39:12David Sims:That was a mistake by them. Tron Aries is another funny one, because it's like the blockbuster version of what we're saying about the prestige movies where they're like, why did Tron Aries underperform? And I'm like, how much time do you have?

2:39:22Alison Willmore:Right, right. And also just like, how much hunger do you think there was for another Tron movie?

2:39:26David Sims:Here are 20 road signs

2:39:28Griffin Newman:I pulled off the freeway warning you not to make this movie. As someone who loves Tron movies, it's like, the appetite is low. So you better make a fucking exceptional Tron movie. If you want to do that, it better be so good. And they're like, oh, we made it really bad. Did you not want it to be good? didn't automatically want to go. We thought the Tron name would sort of carry it over the line. It's like, no, no, no. You need good to get Tron over the line.

2:39:53David Sims:They, you know, they put out like the hook in this movie is Tron comes to our world. Most of it takes place in downtown Los Angeles. I'm like, well, that's the opposite of what I like about Tron movies.

2:40:02Alison Willmore:You know, like you're like, so we're not going to spend a ton of time in the incredibly cool looking digital world. The digitally exciting world of Tron.

2:40:07David Sims:But my first thought there is, I guess that must have been a strategic decision because the last one was so expensive and it didn't quite hit expectations. So maybe that's the way to keep the cost down. and they're like, no, no, no, don't worry. It costs$220 million.

2:40:19Griffin Newman:It's not a cheap looking movie. Go to jail.

2:40:23David Sims:Why the fuck isn't this all inside the computer if you spent that much?

2:40:26Alison Willmore:Right, right. And then they're also like, you know who should be the anchor of this?

2:40:30Griffin Newman:You know who people love now.

2:40:32David Sims:Yes.

2:40:33Alison Willmore:That Jared Leto.

2:40:34David Sims:Right. They offered it to Brett Radner

2:40:35Griffin Newman:and Bryan Singer first and then they were like. Now, Griff, as we wrap our short but eventful miniseries on Lin Ramsey, do you want to give me your top five Lin Ramsey movies, which is all of her movies because she's made five.

2:40:47David Sims:Yes, that is true. I'm just going to go off the dome from my heart here.

2:40:52Griffin Newman:Yes.

2:40:53David Sims:You Were Never Really Here is my favorite. Yes. I would put Morbren Caller at number two. Yes. I would put I could do Ratcatcher 3, Kevin 4, Dime I Love 5. Right. I think she has made five excellent films. I

2:41:08Griffin Newman:have Morbren Caller first. That's the film that I truly adore. And then You Were Never Really Here and Ratcatcher 3rd. Die My Love and Kevin. Yeah. Allison, do you prefer to not talk about Kevin? I would rather not. Do you firmly disagree with either of these rankings?

2:41:24Alison Willmore:I don't know.

2:41:24Griffin Newman:Or what is your favorite Lynn Ramsey movie?

2:41:26Alison Willmore:It would be Morven Collar. Yeah. I think, you know, the scene of her going through the kind of nightclub with the headphones on would be like one of the greatest scenes in cinema that I can think of. And your least favorite, Kevin or Die My Love?

2:41:39Griffin Newman:Or is it something else? Do you not like Hammer Man?

2:41:42Alison Willmore:Probably Die My Love. I do like Hammer Man, but I do feel like that movie always felt to me like it could have gone on longer. Like it just feels so boiled down. I don't know. But I do like Kevin. Here's the thing. That's the thing. I do like. Yeah, we need to talk about.

2:41:55David Sims:I love how like tight and like stripped down You Were Never Really Here is. But after doing the episode and reading the dossier and like having completely forgotten that a totally different cut and a longer cut was shown at Cannes, I now am just a little frustrated. There's no way to watch that cut that I imported my like expensive Australian 4K. And still there's no I just I wish there was like a Terrence Malick criterion release of like here's just like 10 different versions. I don't know which one counts.

2:42:26Griffin Newman:Well we're done talking about Lynn We're done talking about Lynn Next we will talk about Peter Weir We're going right to him because we moved send help up So yeah No no no no We'll do the blankies We'll do the blankies next week

2:42:41David Sims:We'll do the blankies next week

2:42:44Griffin Newman:So there you go So we do have a palate cleanser So there Hope you're happy

2:42:50David Sims:I bet you're gonna eat it up And we did recently put a Ben's Choice on the calendar, but I think it will be on Patreon. But we have quite a good one, I think. Pretty thrilled.

2:43:02Griffin Newman:Yeah. But yeah, that's it. And then so next week, our Joe Reed Blankies episode will happen, one assumes. I mean, that's the plan. And then hasn't been recorded yet. And then are you writing songs? Get to work?

2:43:14David Sims:I have been. Oh. But more importantly, the Clem Dog, Sean Clements, recent guest on the show. He loves to punch him up. He's been sending me a lot. There you go. You know, he's not been... He did right something. Punch up. He's been sending me some voice memos. There's some really exciting shit happening in our text thread. I don't want to overhype it. Yeah, sure. But we've been burning the midnight oil. By which I mean every six weeks, one text.

2:43:38Griffin Newman:And then, yeah, the Cars That Ate Paris will kick off our Peter Weir miniseries and March Madness will kick off. That's probably about to be announced, right? I mean, it's February 22nd, so pretty soon. So look forward to voting for whoever we cover and all that. And that's that. and I'm done and I'm done talking. Goodbye.

2:43:54David Sims:Well, actually, that's not how the podcast ends. I know, but I don't. I regret to inform you. Allison.

2:43:59Alison Willmore:Yes.

2:44:00David Sims:Thank you for being here.

2:44:01Alison Willmore:Thanks for having me.

2:44:02David Sims:People should listen to Critical Darlings.

2:44:04Alison Willmore:Yeah, please listen to it. We do so much talking on it.

2:44:07David Sims:You know what? I listen to some of these podcasts. I queue them up. I press play for hours. And people complain about our show being long. At least we're filling it up with words. And I think you folks do an excellent job as well. Thank you. talking on microphone, pressing record, and making sure people can actually hear it later. So this episode

2:44:27Griffin Newman:is coming out on February 22nd. Yes. As far as the run leading up to the big award ceremony, where are you guys at? Pretty close. So like three weeks away though. Let me see.

2:44:42David Sims:Let me see. We got a little sketchy here. That might be

2:44:45Alison Willmore:this secret agent episode.

2:44:47David Sims:I think the secret agent episode will have just come out and the next episode will actually be a nice little bit of synchronicity our buddy Joe Reed talking sentimental value and then yeah the final three episodes of this season will be Sinners one battle with some sort of final predictions and then a recap there you go Allison anything else you want to plug?

2:45:15Griffin Newman:you got great articles all over Vulture.com. Go check them out. This is true. You reviewed Surratt. You must have written that a while ago. No, I read it this morning. Okay, fair enough. You reviewed Melania. I did review Melania. Thank you for doing the things that I write. You liked Send Help.

2:45:36Alison Willmore:I liked Send Help. Yeah. Yeah.

2:45:38Griffin Newman:There you go. I was just looking at your recent stuff.

2:45:40Alison Willmore:I appreciate it. Oh, my Wuthering Heights review will go up on, I think, Monday.

2:45:46David Sims:Yeah, it'll be up. You've already filed it?

2:45:49Alison Willmore:I have filed it.

2:45:49David Sims:But have you had a chance to, and this I guess goes to both of you, to try out Oakberry's tie-in menu yet?

2:45:57Alison Willmore:I would love to have.

2:45:58David Sims:Because I feel like you can't really speak about the movie.

2:46:00Alison Willmore:This is a fair assessment.

2:46:01David Sims:I don't even know what Oakberry is.

2:46:03Alison Willmore:I will say, there was a point, and I included this in my review, where I said that the interior design choices very much reminded me of Lily Allen's Brooklyn Brownstone.

2:46:13David Sims:Interesting.

2:46:14Alison Willmore:Yes.

2:46:15David Sims:I texted this to, of course, our friend, your former podcast co-host, a past Matt Singer yesterday. Oakberry, which I guess is some chain that sells something. It's like acai bowls. Yeah, had a big sign outside, a love you can taste, and they have two items, a kiss me bowl and a haunt me bowl. And both of them are clearly cups and not bowls.

2:46:38Alison Willmore:That's a big lie. I mean, I'm happy for Matt because honestly, he ends up eating a lot of like pancake and burger-based menus. Yeah, this is healthier. It's a positive trend for him. Yeah, for someone who eats a lot of movie-themed tie-in menus, it's good that he'll get some vegetable, or some fruits, at least. Right. Yeah.

2:46:54David Sims:And maybe if, like, Project Hail Mary can do, like, a Metamucil tie-in. These are just the things that would really help the singer family.

2:47:00Alison Willmore:Or at least, like, a Sweetgreen or something like that. Yeah.

2:47:04David Sims:Maybe that's for Super Mario Galaxy. Thank you for being here.

2:47:07Alison Willmore:Thank you.

2:47:08David Sims:Thank you all for rating, reviewing, and subscribing. I'm thanking you for a thing I'm asking you to do. Please. This will be ignored, much like Jennifer Lawrence plugging her movie at the end of a Hot Ones episode. Tune in next week for The Blankies. And a special bonus treat. We want to kind of shout out Matt Johnson and Jay McCarroll of Nirvana, the band, the show, and Nirvana, the band, the show, the movie, now in theaters. One of our favorite movies in a long time. We got offered the opportunity to have them on the podcast. which we could not pass on, but because of our silly schedule, booking and recording very far in advance, the thing it made the most sense to have them do was another Oops All Burger Report episode on Patreon, which we have titled Burger Report The Segment The Episode.

2:48:03David Sims:So that is already out now on Patreon. We moved our schedule around to get that out fast. So The Wicked Films will be happening next month to finish off our Oz series. But as of February 21st on the Blank Check Patreon, Burger Report, the segment, the episode. And we want to play you a little preview clip of that episode. A little sample, a little taster, a little slider for your enjoyment right here. We're here today to do something very important with two very important guests. This show, going on for over a decade. There was one episode where I came in and said, I'm sitting on a really hot scoop.

2:48:42David Sims:I went to the Apple Pan in Los Angeles. I was on a trip to Los Angeles, was eating a burger at the counter, and who saddles up next to me? But Chivo himself, Emmanuel Lubezki, Academy Award winning cinematographer. Yeah, great artist. And I go, Sims, I got something really hot to tell you in this next episode. You're never going to believe it. And I offer my report of seeing one of America's greatest living film artists, one of the world's greatest living film artists, chomped down on a burger, crunch. and Sims goes, you're never going to believe this. I went to Bear Burger over the weekend.

2:49:16Griffin Newman:It was Moo Burger, but that's okay. Fuck.

2:49:18David Sims:And I saw Michael Shannon. Yep. Academy Award nominee. Yep. Michael Shannon also eating a burger and we decided this is a new segment. Every single episode, we're going to do a burger report and check in on which famous people, famous as we like to call them, we have seen eating a burger in the last week. Usually nothing.

2:49:38Griffin Newman:The well ran really dry really, really fast. Right. We live in New York, too. It's like, you know, it's not like you live in Hollywood. Well, yeah, go ahead.

2:49:44David Sims:But then we found out producer Ben, our own intro-outro-meister himself, Yes. had in past lives worked at celebrity hotspot restaurants with famed burgers and was able to reach into the archives and start giving us a burger report at the end of every episode. Eventually, that well runs dry. Yeah. And we decide we need to start soliciting from listeners. We set up a voicemail and then we forgot about this voicemail line for a couple of years. And so now basically every two years, once a year. About every year. But the whole point is we don't remind people. And every time we do one, we act like, that's probably the last one, right?

2:50:23David Sims:Never doing it ever again. But today we are fucking opening up the voicemail bank.

2:50:28Griffin Newman:Yep.

2:50:28David Sims:And we're listening to people tell us about times they've seen a famous person eat a burger. So ridiculous that these guests are here for this nonsense. It's kind of, it feels kind of correct.

2:50:39Griffin Newman:Yeah, I agree. You're here.

2:50:41David Sims:First of all, the big project of your life, but specifically the project that you're promoting right now, is a similar kind of decades-long investment into the mounting, the pyramid of bits. Is that fair to say?

2:50:56Griffin Newman:Yeah. We've been making this. The pyramid of bits? You say bits or bids?

2:51:00David Sims:I said bits, but we could bid. We could bid on the bits. We could do a bit bid. Yeah, I understand the metaphor.

2:51:08Griffin Newman:Yeah, it's clean. Began is a bit. Yes. But pyramid is not correct. No, pyramid's wrong. It's more like a bit organism that you keep feeding and becomes gigantic. So like a sourdough starter, but it's out of control. Right. The bite of a burger turns into many burgers. That's how. And what seemingly starts as something very silly like, oh, it's just celebrities eating burgers. Right. It's now become a show format. It's become a show format.

2:51:38David Sims:Yeah, literally you have a format which could spin out and become a film. We're looking to sell. Honestly, we're looking really hard to sell. We feel like this is our exit strategy. Oh, in the big picture? Like this is going to be... Well, that's a rival podcast. We don't want to talk about them. But in our big picture, we love them. We're friends, but competitors. Right, right, right. Right. In our picture, it's like we're looking for that golden parachute. And this may be it. Can we just fucking sell Burger Report? Can Carson Daly host it? You know, is it a gotcha show?

2:52:08Griffin Newman:Is it like a is it Carson Daly is the guy with the juice right now? That's a good call.

2:52:12David Sims:I feel like he's really coming to his own. I think he's kind of figured his thing out. Carson Daly. Carson Daly.

2:52:19Griffin Newman:I thought he was done. I'm worried that you're making these burger episodes at the furious rate of one per year. And you're trying to now sell it as a format that, in your own words, is going to lead to retirement.

2:52:31David Sims:It's a supply and demand kind of thing. That's the that's my point.

2:52:34Griffin Newman:Right. that it doesn't seem like you have either.

2:52:37David Sims:I think people are demanding it and we're going like, no. Just wait, half of them also

2:52:41Griffin Newman:will not be about people eating burgers. It'll be more like, I don't know, I think I saw Sean Penny to Taco. Well, that's what you guys are here to do.

2:52:47David Sims:We need to judge how successful these are as Burger Reports. And we should say our guest today from Nirvana, the band, the show, and Nirvana, the band, the show, the movie, but also Blackberry. And a thing I want to lead with, because I got questions. Matt and Bird break loose.

2:53:04Griffin Newman:Yes. Yes, one of our high moments in terms of artistic achievement. Matt Johnson and Jay McCarroll are here. And we're so happy to be here. Thank you so much. Thank you for having us. Genuinely, thank you for being here. It's an honor. Do your listeners know what this place looks like? They got a sense. They've caught glimpses, but why? What's your impression? I just want to give people an image that they can maybe assign to this podcast. It feels like we are backstage at a video game store. backstage at a toy store. Like just the behind the scenes look. It's the most conducive environment to a conversation I've ever been in in my life.

2:53:44Griffin Newman:Ben is blushing. Look at it. Look how proud Ben is. We're at four distinct and discreet, almost student-style desks. Yeah, professional. Yeah, it's almost like for a draft, somebody who's like a professional draftsman. Yeah. And they're at perfect 90-degree angles to one another and we're all facing each other in the middle as though we're about to judge something that's going to happen. We are. We're going to judge these phone calls. Yeah. Imagine the LAN party that we could have in here. Oh, man. Let's bring in some CRT televisions. We really could. The gas cables. Yeah. Anyway, yeah. It's an honor to be here and we're so happy to be here.

2:54:20Griffin Newman:And I don't think the burger format is going to travel outside.

2:54:25David Sims:You haven't heard the calls yet, though. That's what I'm saying. And maybe I don't put this pressure on you.

2:54:29Griffin Newman:I don't mean, no, no, no, no. Listen, listen. And I believe that the way to treat a friend is to give them the kind of advice that will truly improve their life. I agree. I think that blunt talk is usually. And this isn't even blunt. Again, it may be incredible. But the idea that this is going to turn into a like Carson Daly. We're talking. This is insanity.

2:54:47David Sims:You guys got this hot movie. You're tapped into the culture. You know what the public wants. So you should listen to us. But I'm saying you should listen to the calls. And then I want to hear you go. Hey, it's more. This is less than this. Maybe I'm leaving tonight with the rights to Burger Report. We'll cut you into this big time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Big time. Because there's something here and we haven't quite cracked it.

2:55:08Griffin Newman:We made an entire episode of our show called The Burger, which is centered around the magical properties of biting a burger and making a wish at the same time.

2:55:18David Sims:Yes.

2:55:18Griffin Newman:Yeah.

2:55:19David Sims:So that's a thing we haven't worked into this format yet.

2:55:23Griffin Newman:Are there still Wahlburgers in Toronto? I think there might be one at the airport. I think there's one at YYZ. Yeah, it looks like that's about it. Yeah, it's at the airport. I think there's nothing wrong with them. They were totally fine. I think it was a cultural mismatch, if I'm being totally honest. You walked in and it's a full standee of one of the Wahlberg brothers standing there as though he's still in Boston being like, hey, Toronto, come on. These are the best burgers. And Torontonians are too shy. Not the guy who'd be your first choice. I think we're getting down to third, fourth, or fifth.

2:55:52Griffin Newman:But by the time you're at the guy who's been given a burger franchise. Yes. I don't mean to disparage them. The show, at the very least, was inspiring. We made a whole episode of our show about it. Great episode. But it was not a cultural match. They thought that maybe the East Coast-ism of Massachusetts would drive all the way up. Right. But there's a hard cut at the border. It's like, you guys like hockey? Like baseball, right? We're, you know, we're near water. It's basically the same vibe. No, no, that's fresh. And it's a huge, huge difference. What's Toronto's best burger? That's very touchy.

2:56:23Griffin Newman:I assume that's a contentious. Of course, it always is. It depends who you asked. for the longest time, there was a place that was just, just outside the border of Etobicoke called Apache Burger that is not changing the name. They don't give a damn. I was about to say, like something of a sensitive name. Yeah. And this place was famous for having burgers that were so great that oftentimes sports figures like the Toronto Maple Leafs would drive out and have their burgers here. But they recently switched from fresh to frozen and it was like they fell off a cliff. But I mean, look, they still have...

2:56:54Griffin Newman:Char-Broiled is the way they were doing it. Yeah. And it was old school, old school tar broiled but now priest is i think the other one burgers priest sold to harvey's i think like everything changed yeah yeah yeah yeah that guy that guy that's belange's buddy by the way he's got an unbelievable story like unbelievable when a summer that they were at summer camp and they needed to set up on their own this is not my story to tell but all i will say is like camping you're saying no this is a phone right children's summer camp okay and the owner believed that his son had gone on a cocaine crazed rampage and was using the camp as a kind of orgy slash party zone.

2:57:32Griffin Newman:And in order to catch him employed his these two employees, one of which was the production designer of all of my films. The other was the guy who started Burgers Priest to develop and instigate on their own a closed network hidden camera system throughout the camp where they could film and capture this renegade son doing all kinds of things. They did it and it worked. And they were like, they caught him. They were like 14 years old. And they basically did a dragnet. What did they catch him doing? Yeah, they were. They got video evidence of his drug-fueled party mania that was happening at a children's camp.

2:58:11Griffin Newman:And anyway, so this guy goes on. Oh my God. But no, but this did not involve the campers. That was the big thing. It was like, he would bring in outsiders, counselors, these types of things. He was like a junior counselor? Well, this guy doing it was the son of the owner. So you can only imagine what his position in terms of the leadership. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, literally. He decided this is mine to stomp on. He was like Prince, who's the guy in Game of Thrones, you know, who just gets it. And now he's going to be as despotic as he wants to be. I've never watched Game of Thrones. I've never seen it.

2:58:42Griffin Newman:Joffrey, yeah, right. He's just like, well, this is all mine. And so I bear no responsibility. I didn't build it. Anyway, Burger Priest is a phenomenon in the city. The burgers are unbelievable. And they're all and they're closely associated with New Testament scripture. OK. The priest is not ironic. Oh, so it's a spiritual burden. It's a spirit. OK. Their tagline is redeeming the burger one at a time. So it's all it's all very like religious language anyway. But the franchise was a like a instant hit in the city of Toronto. So much so that it has now sold to Harvey's, which if you don't know, Harvey's is the sister restaurant to Swiss Chalet.

2:59:19Griffin Newman:So these two mega restaurants. It's about to fall off a cliff. Well, who knows? I don't mean to disparage them. It's been around forever and it's delicious. Okay, I'll go next to them there. But Toronto, you want to think of it as a super mini New York in that there's like 50 different places doing their own special burgers, a place called Rudy's. There's, for a long time, Matty Matheson had a burger place called P &L. I went there. I went there. I went to P &L. P &L Burger. Now Matty's got his own burger place right just south of Trinity Bellwoods Park. I forget Mattie's Patty's that's where I went those are great but Happy Burger is also great like you come to Toronto looking for a hamburger you could eat a different burger every single day and be happy but we don't have like Hamburger America right that place

3:00:04David Sims:we don't have the kind of stuff you have yeah but we didn't have that until very recently Hamburger America

3:00:10Griffin Newman:felt like it was very much filling a hole yeah the problem with that is it opened right by my office and I cannot I have to like not go that out that's not a problem I could kill myself

3:00:18David Sims:That's only a problem of perception in your mind. I've never been in my life.

3:00:22Griffin Newman:I want to go so badly. I may even go right after this. You should go. Recommend it. Yeah. It's easy to get there. I'll tell you what train to take. Anyway, on the subject of burgers, it's completely right. Yeah. Toronto's a great hamburger city. It's a great, great food city. Yeah. I mean, the first time I went to Toronto, I'm from New York. I grew up in London. I was like, these two cities have been merged into one city for me, is how I felt about Toronto. I was like, it's sort of a New York-y city with more of an English energy. Queen on the money. Like, I know it's neither, really. Always good.

3:00:53Griffin Newman:You want your money to have the types of people on it that are separated from you by dint of birth. By just... Because in America... Just what birth canal they exited. It makes a big difference because here in America, like, you know, you see a bill and you're like, oh man, if I work really hard, I could get on this bill. Which is true. In Canada, it's not... No, I'm sorry. It's not possible. Well, are there nice Canadians on the backs of the bill or whatever. Yeah, they put some inventors on there, but there are precious few of those. I think Banting and Best... John A. MacDonald is a little bit...

3:01:24Griffin Newman:has a colored history, doesn't he? My point is that... You're talking about our prime ministers. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. They put our prime ministers on the bill, but on the back of all of them is the queen. You've always got the... Well, now the king. Is the queen on the back of all of it? Used to be, but in all the coins, the queen was on the back of every single one. Now... Yeah, you switch into Charlie. No, I think our country's done all kinds of bizarre things. they switched to a polymer bill, first of all. Of course. And now it's all like... It's monopoly money. Yeah, I think...

3:01:54David Sims:Rich Uncle Pennybags is on the back now, right? Yeah. Which would be great. It'd be great. I mean, that...

3:01:59Griffin Newman:I just think... He equals money. He's good at business. He understands how to run a country like a business. So does the way the game work is that you're buying the properties from him? No, I don't actually know what role he plays. Okay, but wait a second. No, this is an interesting take. Maybe he owns the bank. Maybe you're all just dealing with his money.

3:02:19David Sims:I've never considered this. It certainly feels like he owns the bank, but I also feel like you're buying the properties from him.

3:02:24Griffin Newman:It's funny because that is bad strategy. He owns the board. He could just hotel up everything right off the bat. It does seem like he has the last laugh no matter what.

3:02:33David Sims:Exactly. That's the point. You never get to the end of Monopoly, and if you do, no one's happy, right? You're playing in a world that this guy has already monopolized, and he's like, have your fucking fun. Try your best.

3:02:44Griffin Newman:Just try, but it's all coming back to me. Yeah. They're making a big Monopoly movie right now. Thank God. Like a big, big, big one.

3:02:50David Sims:Well, these questions are going to get answered.

3:02:51Griffin Newman:Who would be good casting for them?

3:02:53David Sims:For Rich Uncle Pennybags? Chris Pratt. I do. Throw him in there. I used to do, I forget who the advertiser was, who the sponsor was, but it was some online banking company that I'm sure is super reputable and still in business. But I would do ad reads for them as Rich Uncle Pennybags. Moneybags? Pennybags? Moneybags? Pennybags is the name. And then the bit became that he had been canceled and got replaced with Christopher Plummer. So in my mind, I'm like, Christopher Plummer would have been the great prestige uncle. Pennybags, but now he's dead. We lost our chance. We lost him.

3:03:26Griffin Newman:Anthony Hopkins? Hopkins. Wow. Hopkins. Starring Kevin Hart. The movie centers on a boy from Baltic Avenue on a quest to make a fortune? This is the Monopoly movie? And Bella Tarr is directing this? Belly's dead. Belly's dead. Just died. Well, he wrapped and then he... Yeah, he wrapped. Oh, I see. It's an ice white sun. Oh, yeah. People are going to question, like, was this his cut?

3:03:47David Sims:And it's a tight Rondo minute. Yeah, it's like many Bellator films. He really wanted to go commercial. He wanted to make something his kids could see. And as always, I think the ultimate takeaway is Die My Love's box office failure was due to a lack of Oakberry tie-in.

3:04:04Griffin Newman:Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hosley. Our creative producer is Marie Barty Salinas. And our associate producer is AJ McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithy Research by J.J. Birch Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery in the Great American Novel With additional music by Alex Mitchell Artwork by Joe Bowen, Ollie Moss, and Pat Reynolds Our production assistant is Minnick Special thanks to David Cho, Jordan Fish, and Nate Patterson for their production help Head over to BlankCheckPod.com for links to all of the real nerdy shit Join our Patreon, Blank Check Special Features, for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes.

3:04:48Griffin Newman:Follow us on social at Blank Check Pod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook, on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions.